


Hive

by LitGal



Series: Hive [2]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Hybrids, M/M, Wraith, Wraith John, Wraith culture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-21
Updated: 2014-09-21
Packaged: 2018-02-18 06:55:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 32,587
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2339252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LitGal/pseuds/LitGal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I am finally admitting that I will not go back and finish Hive John, but I don't want to leave people wanting either.  This is a series of scenes (a lot of scenes that will give a complete picture of where this is going) showing what happens after Todd finds a way to turn John and Rodney into his hive mates.  Those two always managed to stop the bad guys, so this is what happens when they are the bad guys.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. On Atlantis

John stirred as a familiar presence disturbed his sleep. He uncurled slowly, his Wraith muscles loath to leave hibernation so early, but John found that if he slept longer than twenty-two hours a day, the humans grew concerned. So he never let himself sink too deeply.

Rodney checked with him, his familiar thought spiders doing a quick inventory of John’s mind while John tried to shake off sleep. He could feel Todd’s amusement. Rodney was growing frustrated with the separation, but they had only been apart seven months. For Todd, that was a heartbeat. John’s seed was still spreading. Rodney’s two ships were still on the planet, growing into the shapes Rodney had chosen for them. Todd had managed to claim three new hive members when he picked up Anne Teldy’s team, but other than that, it was time to wait. They needed to grow strong. As long as Rodney’s micro-satellite was still there, still allowing the hive mind to reach across subspace, John didn’t care.

John blinked up to find Lorne outside the cell. “That looks uncomfortable,” Lorne said. “I could get you a mattress.”

“Don’t bother. The floor is better—cleaner,” John said as he climbed to his feet. He didn’t point out that Lorne couldn’t afford to give the prisoner any more breaks. Caldwell was already unhappy with the situation. However, Carson had insisted on certain conditions, and Lorne had been quick to agree, which left Caldwell backed into a corner. 

Lorne studied John for a second. “Is it normal for you to sleep this much?”

John stretched his hands over his head, enjoying the freedom to do so before he had to wear the restraints. “It saves energy. Besides, when I’m awake, I’m bored, and we both know I get myself in trouble when I’m bored.”

“You get yourself shot in the guts by Caldwell’s goons,” Senior Airman Elliott muttered. She was not a fan of their new commander. 

Where John would have thrown everything into finding Teldy’s team, Caldwell had authorized a two week survey of the planet where they vanished, found evidence of Genii onsite, and then turned the disappearance over to the diplomatic team while scaling back search and rescue to only a skeleton crew. It had not earned him any love from the men. Caldwell was an efficient leader—John could admit that. Costs were down and productivity up in terms of planets surveyed and technology found. John could read that from the infected computers every time he opened his hive mind to Atlantis. However, what he gained in efficiency, cost him in terms of loyalty. This was now a posting, not a home. 

John had read Lorne’s reviews, and Caldwell was also not fond of him. John suspected that O’Neill kept Lorne here to counterbalance Caldwell, but it meant that Lorne had just been passed over for another promotion and his position with Caldwell was strained. John felt bad for him, but there was nothing he could do, except stop Lorne from ordering him a mattress.

Todd repeated his observation that Lorne would be a good hive member, but he didn’t push the issue. 

Lorne gestured to Elliott, and she moved to the side and prepared her weapon. She might not like Caldwell, but she was very willing to shoot John if he proved a threat. She was logical, cool. John wanted to know what she would feel like in the hive mind. Next time she went on a survey mission, John might give Todd a nudge to go pick her up. 

Todd approved. Rodney made a disagreeable noise about too many military minds with their limited intelligence infecting the hive, but under the expected grumbling, he did approve of her. Mehra and Teldy both gave their ready approval. They admired the woman, and there was an undercurrent of smugness that Todd found so many of the women superior enough to join the hive. The military had not been kind to these women, and being judged as so much better than the likes of Caldwell, who had held them back in promotions, amused them greatly.

Lorne turned off the force field, and set the restraint belt on the bars. John picked it up, wrapped it around his own waist and then turned his back to Lorne so he could fasten it and lock it in place. John waited until Lorne was locking his second wrist into its padded cuff before asking the same question he asked every day. “Any word on Todd?”

Lorne sighed and looked at him sadly. “He isn’t coming, Sheppard.” It had taken Lorne a long time to stop calling him “sir” or “colonel,” but he still had that deep dislike of keeping John prisoner. Part of Lorne wished that Todd would come.

“It hasn’t even been a year. You don’t understand much about Wraith strategy,” John said.

“Oh?” Lorne was still a good officer, and he took every opportunity to pick up any intel he could. John slipped him enough to make Lorne’s reports mildly interesting for the eggheads back home. After all, when John stopped saying interesting things, he had no doubt the NID would win the fight to haul him through the Stargate and dissect him.

Todd pointed out that he would destroy the Earth to get to John before that would happen. John felt the truth of it. Todd’s hive had all died, and Todd felt the unique pain of a Wraith forcibly cut off from a hive mind. Todd would not have it again. When they’d been in those Genii cells, Todd was nearly catatonic with loneliness, and John come, not with hive mind but with emotions that projected acceptance. Of course at the time John hadn’t realized Todd was a Wraith, but that didn’t matter. Todd would have happily killed for John because John had saved him from the insanity that had trapped him as much as the iron bars. In return, Todd would protect John. 

Rodney grumbled that he should then bring John home to the hive.

John chided him. On Atlantis, John could oversee the infection of the computers, he could mine the computers for tactical data and keep the hive informed of every move. John was useless to help Rodney build his ships, but he was valuable here. John wanted to bring value to the hive.

Todd soothed him with praise. He was valuable. No other could manage the humans as well as John. 

John cleared his throat and tried to push hive mind aside enough to focus on his cell, on Lorne and Elliott. Lorne had asked about Wraith strategy.

“Todd is older than you think,” John said. “The Ancients were experimenting on them to try and find a way to make a human body immortal, but once they’d succeeded, they realized that it required too much of the iratus instinct to remain in the body. Todd was one of those created by the Ancients. He was born on Atlantis.”

Lorne was in the middle of unlocking the cell, but he turned and stared at John. “Todd was born here? He’s actually ten thousand years old?”

John nodded and pulled against the restraints to get them into a more comfortable position. One of the jumpsuit buttons was poking him. “Yep. So if he’s busy, he may leave me here for three or four years and think nothing of it. Maybe longer. He’ll finish whatever he’s doing and then start looking for me.” 

And he’d come with twin hive ships that were grown together under Rodney’s supervision. Each had a pair of stolen ZPMs from Todd’s weapons cache and each was more powerful than anything the Wraith had ever built. Part of that was the structure around which they were growing. Rodney had used the empty hulls from old Ancient warships to provide the internal structure that a Wraith hive normally lacked. Biological structure, like bone and cartilage took too much space. Rodney’s twins would have the recuperative ability of hive ships with thick skins and muscle and biological technology. However, they would have the rigidity and internal structure of an Ancient warship. He would trade an ability to grow for a massive size and weapons readiness. John could already see the terrifying possibilities.

Wraith minds were like calm water, and like water, they did not seek to be more than they were already. Rodney’s tornado thoughts had brought to the hive a desire to innovate and improve and they had brought an understanding of Asgard and Ancient technology that was unequalled in any other hive. John was proud to be part of Todd’s hive. They were strong.

“Holy crap,” Lorne said softly. For a second, John thought he was reacting to the stunning power of Rodney’s twins, but then he realized that Lorne was still talking about Todd’s age. This was going to be a more interesting report than usual.

“That’s the main reason Todd doesn’t like Ancients all that much,” John pointed out. “Of course if someone used me as a guinea pig, I don’t think I’d like them either.”

“Isn’t that what Todd did to you?” Lorne asked. He took John’s arm and pulled him out for his daily walk. They would go out to the east pier, John would have two hours to walk and lay in the sun and eat and do whatever else he wanted while under guard, and then Lorne would bring him back here for another 22 hour long nap.

“Nope. He brought me into the hive. He made me part of him so that I could feel how valued I was. He made me part of Rodney and part of Mehra and Stackhouse and the others.” They’d had this conversation before, but John gave the same answer every time and hoped that eventually it would sink in that he was happy being hive.

Lorne fell silent as he escorted John to a transporter and then out to the east pier. It was drizzling rain, but John wasn’t going to let that ruin his two hours of fresh air. He walked out under the sky and closed his eyes. 

He could feel the rain drops against his skin, but he also could feel Rodney soaking in the heat of an alien sun, pride filling him as he watched the twin ships grow. He could feel Todd orbiting the planet with Mehra and Teldy at his side. He could even feel the shadows of dozens of drones, full Wraith and hybrid, each charged with some task that kept them in close to one of the core hive members. Stackhouse was more than a drone, but less than those who carried the blue markings. He was a warrior. He adored the hive and Todd, but he felt a pull toward Mehra, and he was working near her. For a moment, John was free and was walking the ship with his hive, and that’s all he needed. Rodney’s spiders moved through his brain, wishful, hoping, hungry for John’s touch. John promised they would have time enough later.

John started walking, ignoring the way his orange jumpsuit clung to his skin when it got wet. Lorne and Elliott stood under the closest cover and watched.

When John got to the end of the dock, he stood and looked out over the water. Reaching out, he found the web that was now Atlantis’ computer. Her song was sweet again, sounding almost like a hive ship—alive and warm and eager for the love of her people. She opened to him, allowing him to read computer files and check on the progress of the seed. They had not yet reached the star drives, but the control chair was finally infected. Eventually Radek would carry live seed to the drive crystals. The spare crystals were all infected now as well.

John reviewed a report and smiled. They had brought in a new command crystal they’d found in another city, and Radek had declared it contaminated because it had slightly different refractive properties than all of Atlantis’ infected crystals. He theorized that it was from another system or perhaps a different crystal growing facility, but he refused to allow it to be installed on Atlantis. The irony was beautiful. Todd agreed.

“Sir, how long are they going to keep him here?” Elliott asked Lorne. No doubt she thought that John was far enough away that he couldn’t hear.

John knew the answer to that already. The IOC didn’t want him on earth. He scared them. The NID were arguing for his transfer back to earth for biological study and decontamination. Such a nice euphemism. Caldwell had proposed trying him as a traitor and either exiling him to a planet with a broken Stargate or executing him. O’Neill had vetoed killing him, but he had said that exile might be an option. Woolsey, surprisingly, had outmaneuvered all of them and earned time for Carson to work on a cure. He’d pointed out that he was in charge of the expedition, and the treatment of an ill member of the expedition was his business—his and Carson’s.

These people recorded everything on their computers. They were obsessive about it, not that John was complaining. It would be much more stressful if he didn’t have such detailed reports from Atlantis. 

Lorne sighed. “We need to worry when they ask to transfer him. If they send him back to earth, he won’t live long after that.”

“Shit.” Elliott went silent. 

John wondered if he should invite her into the hive… give her the option instead of having Todd take her. Teldy immediately agreed. Her own turning had not been as rough and brutal as John’s but she still disliked thinking about it. Rodney called them all sentimental idiots because of course she would say no, people were morons. He’d thought that back when he had been a person. Todd remained oddly silent.

“Lunch time,” Lorne called. John turned and found that an airman had delivered a plate. John headed back to the cover, his jumpsuit now uncomfortably wet.

“You look like a drowned rat,” Lorne said when John got under the cover. It was starting to really rain hard now.

“You know, Major, with such talent at sweet talk, I’m surprised you’re still single.” 

Elliott quickly smothered a laugh, and Lorne rolled his eyes. “Eat your lunch.”

John sat near the rail and let Lorne lock the belt to the railing before unlocked John’s left hand. Today it was some sort of tuber stew, chocolate cake, and fresh bread. John ate and looked out at the rain. The only two people John couldn’t really keep track of through the computer were Teyla and Ronon. He was always hungry for information about them. However, Lorne always evaded his questions. John glanced over.

“If Teyla or Ronon wanted to play guard for the day, I wouldn’t mind,” he said.

Lorne gave him a long look. “Ronon might shoot you.”

“He wouldn’t be the first guard to do that.”

“He’d be the first to shoot you in the head,” Lorne said.

John grimaced. There was that. “Lorne,” John said softly, “if Dr. Parrish got a goa’uld, would you still try and keep up with where he was, what he was doing?”

For a long time, Lorne didn’t answer. Eventually he sighed. “Yeah,” he agreed, “yeah, I would.”

John had learned patience. His words had planted a different sort of seed, and now he just had to wait. His time was soon up, and John carried his empty plate. After all, Lorne and Elliott had to keep their hands free to shoot him in the back if need be. John rolled his eyes. Neither of them would fire unless John forced the situation, yet they were so determined to put up an illusion.

Humans.

The one-daily trip to the cafeteria to drop off his plate was the only time John saw anyone other than his guards of the day. Radek was at a table across the room. He always seemed to be at lunch when John came in, and Miko was at his side. John smiled at them and nodded. 

“Sheppard, eyes forward,” a voice snapped. John slowly turned to look right at Caldwell.

“When I was an officer, I put up with that shit. Now I don’t have to,” John said as he put his tray down on the trash counter.

Caldwell moved forward. He had aggression in there, but more than that, he had fear. He knew John was a threat, and he couldn’t figure out how. He wanted to protect his people, but he was confused about the best way to do that. Part of him wanted to put a gun to John’s head, but he was too good of an officer to do that. More than most humans, Caldwell projected every emotion out into the air around him. He stunk of hormones and secretions. John wondered if it had anything to do with the fact that he tried so hard to hide his emotions from other humans.

Rather than go toe to toe with the man, John shifted backwards and leaned his elbow against the counter so that his whole body was canted to one side, his hip popped out to the side. Caldwell was almost apoplectic with rage. John wondered if he could lecture Caldwell on the inadvisability of losing your temper in front of subordinates. Todd was there in John’s mind with him. The mental web was so much stronger now that Atlantis herself was part of it. 

Todd provided a quick comparison. When John had held Todd prisoner, Todd knew that there was a point past which John did not care about his orders. He would act on his own feelings. That’s what he’d done when he fed a human to Todd to strengthen him. But this one… he would deny his own feelings and follow orders to the end. Todd had little respect for that. Caldwell’s rules held him in thrall more closely than the hive held John.

“Be careful, Sheppard. The day is going to come that Woolsey isn’t here to protect you.” With that, Caldwell turned and walked away.

John looked around the cafeteria and saw the shifting emotions. Radek was quietly furious, and Miko—she might be quiet, but if she wasn’t plotting Caldwell’s death, John would eat his jumpsuit. She had a sharp, hard core to her. A few of the soldiers had emotions that felt more dangerous. They agreed with Caldwell. However most were uncomfortable with the harsh treatment of someone they saw as an infected leader—a soldier brought down by a disability. That division did not speak well of the future of these humans.

“Shep, come on. Let’s get out of here,” Lorne urged him. He took John by the arm and led him out of the cafeteria and down to the common showers attached to the workout rooms. John often caught the mixed scent of Teyla and Ronon down here. They sparred together. Often. He wondered if they were closer now that the rest of their team had been taken.

John ached to have them in the hive again.

But for now, he played his part. A new jumpsuit was waiting for him in the shower room. Lorne let him walk into the back shower area and then closed the prison door Caldwell had ordered installed. John stood with his back against the door and let Lorne unlock the restraints through the bars. Soon enough, John was free and he passed the restraints and then the jumpsuit through the bars. 

John peed over the drain and then turned the hot water on. When they had first started this routine, Lorne had watched every move. A human might have thought it was some sexual interest, but John could see the horror and morbid fascination that swirled around him in a cloud. When John had on the jumpsuit, he looked almost human. But naked, no one could mistake him as anything but part Wraith. His back and knobbed spine were nothing human, and his genitals were blue as well and his balls significantly larger. The production of seed necessitated a biological factory, and the Wraith DNA had settled there where the human body already had a reproductive capacity. However, the seed would then travel up through a series of ducts.

That explained the blue veins that ran down the back of John’s arms to his palms. The veins blossomed into a tangle of colors that looked like a strange bruise or varicose veins along the inside of his wrist.

Nothing about him looked human now. Well, his legs were fairly human, and his chest. John fingered his feeding scar. That was very human.

“Twenty-two minutes,” Lorne warned him.

Considering it took ten to get him into restraints and walk him down a hall, that meant John had very little freedom left for today. He grabbed the soap and started washing. Atlantis hummed around him, happy to have him in her, but lonely for others. The humans—they had no way to feel her, and she couldn’t feel them.

Todd insisted that the seed John had used would not lead to a sentient creature, but John was starting to think Todd may have been wrong. Of course it didn’t change Todd’s plans. One way or another, humans would lose Atlantis, and now she was looking forward to the day.

 

 

 

Two month later, Captain Harris had just delivered him back to his cell and John was thinking of curling up for his sleep when Teyla appeared at the doorway. She was conflicted, the emotional colors clashing and straining as he looked at her.

“Teyla,” he said softly.

She looked at him for a long time, and he shifted his weight uncomfortably. Should he give her time or verbally flail the way he would have before he’d joined the hive? He didn’t know what to say. “I… um…” He blew out a breath and tried again. “Hey.”

She moved into the room a step. “John,” she said.

“Well you believe I am John, that’s a start.” He grinned at her.

“I believe you are very much like the John Sheppard I knew, but I also believe you are different.”

John nodded. “That’s fair.” He took a step backward and sat on the bench—the only furniture in his cell. 

Teyla took a moment to look around. He wasn’t sure if she was stalling or assessing the security. The security was good—or it would have been if John hadn’t infected the computers. He could turn it off whenever he wanted, which would leave only the physical bars. Of course the bars were still a fairly significant barrier to freedom, but for right now, John wasn’t worried. He was where he needed to be in order to serve his hive.

“Lorne said you asked after us.”

John grinned. “Yeah. I mean, we’re… we were teammates,” John finished softly. “How are Ronon and Kanaan and Torren?”

“You do not speak the name of Torren!” Teyla snapped out. She moved at him so quickly, that John was on his feet and his eye focus had narrowed down to just her before he could even form a thought. “I will kill you before I let you touch him.”

“I just—” John might have tried to defend himself, but her glare was homicidal. “I won’t mention him again,” John promised.

Teyla took a step back, but the anger and fear still projected off her. “My DNA has been used to do this to you. Michael’s research led to this, and my friend is now gone.”

“You can’t blame yourself when you’re the one person who told us not to go ahead with the Michael experiment,” John said, “Well, you and Ronon. Turns out, you were right. Who knew?” He tried to joke, but Teyla was too emotionally sharp for the humor to work. “Todd didn’t use hybrid DNA. He used pure Wraith DNA to graft onto us. The genetic engineering is all in the virus used to destroy the human tissue and the systems used to graft the two parts together—human and Wraith. This wouldn’t even work if humans and Wraith weren’t very nearly the same species to start with.”

“We are not the same,” Teyla said firmly.

“Well you can’t breed an elephant with a horse. We’re closer than that.”

Teyla looked at him, and her eyes narrowed. “Why do you offer comfort?”

“Because I’m your friend, even if you’re no longer willing to be mine.”

“You are my friend? Yet you would change me into what you are?”

There was a tricky spot. Leave it to Teyla to recognize the truth, and John wouldn’t earn any points by lying. “I wouldn’t want you hurt,” John said.

She lowered her head and studied him like he was a new trading partner she hoped to better understand. He supposed it was a fair metaphor. “I know what my John wanted for me. In your perfect world, what would happen to me?” she asked. That was more blunt than her usual style. John recognized the danger in her question. If he lied or hid too much of the truth, she would know in an instant.

“Everyone sees that Todd changed us, changed me,” John started. Teyla tilted her head to make it clear that she did see that. “But in taking humans into the hive, we change him. He makes different choices to avoid having the hive pulled apart with dissent.”

“And how would you see me in this new world of yours?”

John knew that Todd would never compromise on issues of hive, but he could on those who were not true hive. “You are strong, and you would make a powerful hive mate. We would invite you into our world.”

“You would change me?”

“Yes,” John said. “Only with the change could you become part of us.” John struggled to find the right words. “When I was human, I was cut off from others—isolated. I didn’t understand the world, and I couldn’t see information that lies right out in the open for all Wraith to see. I would offer you a chance to see more, feel more, to be part of your team in a new way. Kanaan has not proved his worth, and he would not be chosen for hive, but he could come with us, live safely among us, as could any of your children. If they proved worthy after they came of age, they could be invited into the hive.”

“Do you really believe that, John?”

“Yes.”

Teyla sighed. “Then you have lost more of yourself than you know. You were not given a choice, nor will any other human. It is in the nature of Wraith to take.”

John was already speaking, already explaining that Wraith could change in the hive mind, but she turned her back and walked out. He’d had one chance to convince her to join, and he’d failed. John stared after her a long time, guilt and pain warring with the comfort of the hive as the other tried to convince him he’d done his best. Eventually John just curled up on the floor in front of the bench and went to sleep. There was nothing else he could do.

 

 

 

 

John had grown used to boredom—month after month of boredom. Sometimes they would even forget him, and Lorne would appear days later, apologizing. Once Teyla had brought food and a bucket for him to use because no one would be able to tend him for a week. Mostly John curled up and slept. 

Atlantis crooned to him, her Wraith and Ancient blend sounding sweet to him again. She was the one who woke him, who whispered angrily about invaders. She didn’t like the Wraith who had found her. They were crude. They didn’t have the song of her hive. That made John come immediately awake—all his Wraith parts tense and ready to spring on the enemy.

John growled as he accessed Atlantis’ computers with far more impunity than normal. No one was paying attention to what he was doing. Wraith were in control of the tower and moving through the science area. John opened himself and let Rodney slide through and take control of Atlantis’ computer. He slammed quarantine doors closed and initiated a hard lockdown. It wouldn’t hold forever, but Radek and a number of scientists were behind those doors. It would give them time.

Rodney grabbed control of Radek’s computer and pulled up schematics, highlighting a service passage that ran under hydroponics. There were hundreds of small rodents there, and they would obscure the Wraith sensors.

Rodney yielded to Todd. A few pieces of the invading Wraith technology were hooked to Atlantis, and Todd began to work on a computer virus that would give them control of the invader’s ships. Mehra and Teldy were near frantic, working the drones to fly faster. Rodney’s twin ships were abandoned on the ground, unable to fly yet, and John could feel a sort of quiet desperation from them. It was nothing compared to the frantic cries of Atlantis. She knew this was wrong. These were not her people who had come.

Another spark flew from the fried remains of the security force field, but John still had the physical bars to deal with. Someone fired a weapon in the hall outside his cell, and John snarled his frustration. He could fight, only they had left him locked up, even as darts appeared in the skies over them. Another burst of weapon fire echoed down the hall, and then Lorne burst into the room.

“Are these Todd’s Wraith?” Lorne demanded, his fury written all over his face.

“No!” John yelled. “Let me out.”

Lorne looked back down the hall and then to John. “They have Caldwell. I have dozens of men down, and they’re rounding up the last of us.”

“Major, open this door right now,” John said. His temper was fraying, and if Lorne was going to stand there and give him a minute by minute report up to the point where they both died, John was going to stop liking him.

“I’m so getting court martialed for this,” Lorne said with a huff, but he went over and hit the manual controls for the bars. “What happened to the force field?”

“It blew up about twenty minutes ago,” John said. It was true enough, but Lorne didn’t need to know why. “Weapon?” He held out his hand.

Lorne hesitated, but after a second, he gave John a spare P90 he had hanging from his vest.

John nodded and checked the clip. “Stay behind me. If I move too fast, get to cover and stay there, I’ll double back.”

“Sir--”

“Major, that’s an order. If Caldwell is gone, you are the ranking officer, and you are not expendable. Clear?”

Lorne gave him a half-amused look, and it really felt like they were fellow-soldiers again--they were near hive-mates. “When you were the ranking officer, you generally ignored that regulation.”

John smiled at him. “Lucky for us, you’re better at following the rules than I am. Let’s go.” John moved out into the corridor and studied the various trails. Dozens of people had been through here recently. A large group had been moving inwards, toward the command chair. Two Wraith were following close behind. His instincts told him to start there. He loped down the hall, Lorne close behind.

“Christ, Sheppard, clear the side passages,” Lorne hissed at him. 

John looked over his shoulder. “Wraith senses. I know when they’re clear. Just stay close.”

Lorne looked a little green, but he gave a nod, and John could feel the determination rolling off him. John didn’t slow until for two more levels. Then he spotted the body lying on the ground. Elliott. She was gasping with pain, but she didn’t have more than five or ten minutes of life left in her. The bastards had drained her until she looked about a hundred, and then left her this much so she could suffer.

“Shit.” John wrapped his hand around the back of her neck and eased her off the steps. This was why his instincts had insisted he go this way—some part of him had sensed her or Atlantis had slipped him some information that he hadn’t consciously noticed because Todd and Rodney were a little distracting.

“Oh God. Elliott.” Lorne got her legs, and they eased her to the side of the hall.

“Hey, sir. I’m… just go get ‘em,” she said. Her gaze moved over to John, but she didn’t flinch away or react. She just smiled. It made the deep wrinkles of her face even more prominent. 

John was not going to lose her, but he needed lifeforce if he was going to try to bring her back. He grabbed Lorne’s arm. “Stay here with her. I’ll be back before…” John looked down.

“We can’t split up,” Lorne argued.

“You can’t come with me to do this.” John took off his P90 and handed it to Lorne before he took off at top speed. Rather than using the stairs, he leaped from level to level using the banisters and railings. He queried Atlantis, and she gleefully sent him the location of the nearest small group of Wraith. She wanted them dead. She wanted them off her decks. They weren’t hers. They weren’t. The humans were hers more than these intruders. John ignored her bloodthirsty complaints and ran in the direction she sent him. In no time he closed in on a pair of Wraith. 

He blasted a challenge scent out into the air. It would be a confusing mass of queen scent, warrior scent and human, but it would slow them down, and John knew it. Sure enough, he turned the corner to find two warriors waiting for him.

Maybe his human appearance distracted them. Maybe they were too far into hive mind. John didn’t care why they stood stock still for a number of seconds, he only cared that they did. He grabbed the first one and slammed his hand down over his chest. John had never used his feeding glands. He had used the seeding glands that were buried right under them, but not the feeding glands. He could feel his palm split open as he dug his claws into the Wraith. Before it could fight back, it was on its knees and aging rapidly.

His partner finally came to life. With a snarl, he threw himself at John. John reacted. Wraith met hybrid Wraith in the middle of the hall, each scrambling for advantage. John blasted the air with queen song, and the warrior twitched and pulled back, and John slammed his feeding hand onto the second Wraith’s chest. This one he drained completely.

John turned to the first Wraith. “I will destroy your hive for touching Atlantis. Your queen will die screaming.” While a Wraith could ignore many threats, John had the glands of a queen. His threat would affect these intruders. And then John was racing back to Elliott and Lorne, fear making him reckless as he leaped from level to level. He thought he saw Ronon at one point, but he couldn’t afford a second to check. Elliott was too close to death.

When John jumped down to the final level, he nearly got shot between the eyes. “Christ,” Lorne swore. “Warn a guy.”

“If you were hive, you would have known,” John said. As explanations went, it sucked, but it was his only excuse for jumping into the line of friendly fire without giving a warning. John knelt next to Elliott. “This is going to hurt like a bitch, but only for a second,” John warned her. He brought his feeding hand down on her chest and for a second nothing happened. Todd had to slip into his mind and show him how to pull up the ability to give life. Then John could feel the frantic energy move from his body into hers. She grew younger right in front of him, and he stopped when she looked like he remembered.

Lorne grabbed his wrist and turned his hand over. “You can feed on humans?”

“Can. Don’t. The mouth had even grown over,” John pointed out. The edges of his feeding mouth were still red and jagged with torn skin. “However when a Wraith attacks me, I can clearly feed on him.”

“I’m not complaining,” Elliott said quickly. “What are we doing now, sir?” she asked. She looked at Lorne, and for a second, Lorne could only stare at John’s hand. It was a lot for him, and John understood that. John remained still under Lorne’s touch and gave the man time to adjust to this reality. Only when Lorne failed to react for a significant time did John try to prod him back into action.

“Do we go for the control tower, the command chair or Radek and the scientists?” John asked. He would let Lorne lead in this.

Lorne shook his head. “They would have grabbed the scientists first.”

“Yeah, but if I know my geeks, the scientists found a way to get away. The geeks always save the day, Major. We’re just around to make sure they don’t kill themselves before they can do it. I thought I taught you that.”

Lorne finally looked up at John’s face. There was still fear there, but resolve and gratitude overpowered it. “Then we find our geeks.”

“I’m on it,” John said. Elliott had grabbed the P90 John had abandoned, but he didn’t actually need it. He did need something less conspicuous than an orange prison jumpsuit. Atlantis reported that the Wraith had stopped killing the humans. The queen wanted to know about this new human-Wraith hybrid and she wanted to question all Lanteans. That gave them some time, but John couldn’t tell the others that. “Stay here. I’m going to find a computer terminal and see if I can’t find where our geeks are hiding.”

“Sir, maybe I should do that,” Lorne suggested. John didn’t have the best reputation when it came to computers.

“Major, I have shared a brain with Rodney McKay. Trust me, if our geeks are hiding, I will be able to figure it out, and in case you missed the floorshow, I can move a lot faster without you. Elliott, Lorne is the ranking officer, so please don’t let him get killed.”

“Yes, sir,” Elliott answered smartly.

John looked at her. “And don’t let yourself get killed. That euphoria you’re feeling, it’s going to make you a little reckless until the enzyme wears off. Don’t push it.”

Elliott’s smile faded as she realized he was serious. “Yes, sir. I will try to exercise more caution than usual.”

“And if you’re twice as careful, you might avoid being three times more reckless. Have Lorne tell you stories about Aiden Ford while I’m gone.”

John had already leapt to the next level up by the time she offered a ‘yes, sir.’ He had not meant to show humans that skill, but he would not lose those who he wanted for hive. Radek, Elliott, Teyla, Carson, Miko, and a dozen others would be protected at all costs. Atlantis opened and closed doors for John, guiding him to a room with appropriate clothing. He quickly shed the orange jumpsuit that had been his only uniform for over a year, and pulled on dark jeans and a dark, long sleeved shirt. At least now he wouldn’t stand out as much to the humans. 

The Wraith would still see him easily, though. 

Atlantis confirmed that the scientists were still in the area under hydroponics, but John still used one of Rodney’s backdoor hacks to get into the Atlantis systems just so it would look good if anyone investigated his story. He’d learned from Todd to treat every mission like a chess game. Have a dozen strategies going at once, and move between them. Right now John hoped to repel the invasion, escape, convince Elliott to ask for the seeding, convince Radek that the computer system had always been sentient, and make himself look like the hero to the common soldiers. If one or more of his games failed, he still had other strategies in play.

Atlantis told him this soldier had a personal sidearm, so John quickly grabbed it and buckled on the holster before heading back down to where he left Elliott and Lorne. “Incoming,” John whispered before dropping onto the floor next to them.

“Very funny, Sheppard,” Lorne said dryly. “We need to move.”

“I got into the security feeds. Wraith have moved to a capture only policy. I think I made an impression on the queen, and she’s probably looking to interrogate people about who I am.”

“In the short term, that’s good,” Lorne said, “but in the long-term it won’t make any difference unless we can save the city.”

“I know.” John didn’t mention that Rodney was going to blast the queen’s ship into tiny little pieces in about twenty six hours if they didn’t take care of it before then. John really wanted to take care of this himself, though. Todd’s old hive wasn’t significantly better than the queen’s ships, and Rodney’s twins weren’t yet ready.

“You weren’t here when I took the city back from Replicators. It was much worse then,” John said. “We can do this.”

Lorne gave him a strange look. 

“You’re thinking that I’m too optimistic and questioning whether I have brain damage, aren’t you?” John asked.

“What?” Lorne looked confused.

John shrugged. “That’s what Rodney always tells me. However, if you notice, we’re still alive, so my optimism isn’t totally unwarranted. And I found our geeks. They’re under the hydroponics labs in service corridors.”

“They’re where? Why would they go to hydroponics?”

John shrugged. “I have no idea. I had barely even logged onto the system, when a map came up and zoomed in on the area. When I brought up cameras, I spotted them.”

“Was Radek sending you a message?” Lorne asked. It was the most logical assumption, even if it was wrong.

“Unless you have another explanation, that’s the one I’m going with,” John agreed.

“So, we get to hydroponics?” Elliott asked.

John shook his head. “You get to hydroponics. I distract the Wraith by making a little trouble.”

“Sheppard,” Lorne said, a clear warning in his voice.

“Hey, I’m not an officer anymore. I don’t have to play by the regulations, and being a hybrid, I have fighting skills from both sides of the DNA fence. I can take these guys on.” John gave them a wide grin, and then jumped up to the next level.

“Be careful!” Lorne called after him, but John was already on the move. He needed to find Ronon. Together the two of them could take care of this queen and her upstart hive.

 

 

 

 

Ronon was stalking a Wraith when John finally tracked him down. He settled down to wait for Ronon to finish before approaching. It was a short fight, and Ronon blasted the Wraith in the head before kicking the body off the balcony. The Wraith of Todd’s memory were stronger—smarter. Maybe there was an instability in the DNA that showed up after several generations. Or maybe the hives had grown lazy and weak when they had no enemy to fight. Todd wasn’t sure, and he didn’t care as long as his hive was strong.

“Ronon,” John said softly. Ronon turned, his weapon pointed at the shadow where John was standing.

“Are these your people?” he asked.

“No. Lorne asked the same thing. I’m starting to feel like you guys don’t trust me,” John said. Ronon grunted.

“Have you found Teyla and her family?” John asked.

“No.”

John didn’t like that, not at all. An angry hiss slipped out, and Ronon’s scent grew more unstable. He had too many emotions going at once to be anything close to mentally healthy. 

John hurried to give him information. That would soothe him. “Lorne found Radek and a group of scientists. He’s going after them. The queen figured out that she has an enemy who isn’t Wraith and isn’t human in the city. She’s going to want answers.”

“So she’s going to torture people instead of just eating them.”

“Pretty much,” John agreed. 

Ronon grunted.

“Look, you can shoot me or we can work together to take out these Wraith and you can think about shooting me later.”

Ronon narrowed his eyes, but he didn’t answer. The air between them was stained with grief and fury and a sort of grieved resignation that leaked from Ronon.

“I know you’re going to want to shoot me either way. After the Wraith forced you to be a worshipper, you said you’d rather die than go through that again, and you think that the best way to be my friend is to kill me,” John said. He understood Ronon’s position—he really did. “Now, I can’t say I agree with that because I really don’t want to be shot. However, I understand your position, so here’s my offer. We work together to get rid of this Wraith threat. Once they’re gone, you’ll do your best to shoot me in the head and I’ll do my best to either escape or incapacitate you without actually killing you.”

Straightening up a little, Ronon studied him. “You’re not John Sheppard.”

“I’m part John Sheppard,” John answered, “and I love the people around here to make a really good ally against this arrogant young queen. Together we can teach her a lesson.” John wasn’t sure it was going to work, but slowly the fury faded, leaving the softer emotions—the regret and grief.

“The truce only lasts until the other Wraith are gone,” Ronon said firmly.

Other Wraith. That didn’t bode well for any long-term peace between them, but John had to worry about that later. “We need to keep them distracted and away from hydroponics, which is Lorne’s target. I also thought we might get a few of our people back.” John preferred that to Ronon’s method of picking off the stragglers who wandered too far from the others.

“Lots more Wraith in those areas,” Ronon warned.

John grinned. “Good. Let’s make a stop by the armory and get a few toys to share with the others when we get them out.

 

 

 

 

John hit the airman, but he made sure to hit him in the stomach where there weren’t bones that could snap and do more damage than he intended. The second airman was slow to realize the danger, and John grabbed his weapon, spun him around and grabbed him by the neck.

“I’m trying very hard to not hurt anyone,” John said. He was still working on both escape and increase support in the rank and file military folk. Those two goals were difficult to work at the same time. “All I want to do is dial out and leave. That’s it. So I’m not a threat to you or yours. Just let go of the weapon, and we can both get what we need.”

“You’ll shoot me the second you get a gun.” 

“You’re too young to be this cynical,” John said. “Geez, wait until you’re thirty to assume the worst in people or you’re going to end up like McKay.” John didn’t give the airman a chance to argue, he wrenched the P90 out of his hand, and probably did some damage to the guy’s wrist along the way. John took the weapon and gave the airman a good push. “Go check on your friend,” he said.

The airman moved carefully close to his friend, and John kept the P90 trained on him. 

“Take your friend’s gun and slide it across the floor toward the stairs.”

The airman followed orders, but he was radiating enough fear to make John’s bones ache. Christ, this kid had no business in the field. “You’re both fine. I really am just going to leave, nothing else,” John promised. “You can even tell Lorne what planet I went to because I plan to be gone three seconds after my boots hit the ground.” John dialed quickly before heading for the stairs.

He was just passing the terrified airman and his groaning friend when someone else came running into the Gate room.

“Isn’t anyone hunting down the last of the Wraith?” John demanded as he caught the scared one by the neck and swung him around to use him as a human shield. “Look, this airman has really had a crappy day, so I promise to not shoot him if you promise to not shoot him. Just back away and let me go through the Stargate and you won’t have any more trouble from me. Okay?”

The new guy had a lieutenant’s insignia on his uniform, but John didn’t recognize him. “You’re Sheppard, right? The former CO who got infected with some Wraith virus.”

“That’s me. The guy locked in a little cell twenty two hours a day. It kind of sucks. I have to say, I’m not going to give you a good review for your accommodations.” John backed up toward the Stargate. He would turn and run for it, only this new lieutenant definitely looked like the sort to shoot and he had a Saiga-12 Automatic Shotgun. John wasn’t sure that even Wraith biology was designed to stand up against that sort of firepower. John got to the bottom of the stairs, and two new people appeared. Lorne and Ronon. Of course.

“Sheppard, put the weapon down,” Lorne ordered. 

John kept up his slow retreat to the Stargate, pulling his airman buddy along with him. “Lorne, it’s best that I just disappear. No more fighting over who gets to own me, no more being locked in a cell for months at a time—hell, years at a time. Sooner or later, they’re going to call for me to be sent back to Earth. Do you want to live with knowing that you sent me to be dissected? You don’t want that.”

“I can’t let you go, Sheppard. You’re sick.”

“And there’s clearly no cure, so you have to choose, Lorne. Do you let me go or do you keep me locked up until someone decides to take me apart? I’m not hurting you. I came here looking for a truce.”

“And when you tell Todd what happened, I don’t think a truce is going to be possible,” Lorne said. “Last chance, Sheppard. One more step and I will order Ronon to stun you.”

John stopped. That wasn’t an idle threat. “How long have we known each other, Lorne? Don’t do this.”

“The Sheppard I know never would have taken a hostage.”

John snorted. “Hell, I did that before I ever got seeded. It’s called surviving in hostile territory, Lorne. When the Genii captured you, what would you have done to free yourself?”

Lorne was wavering. 

“They’ll kill me. The IOC, the NID… sooner or later one of them is going to want me strapped down to a table so some scientist can start cutting pieces out of me. I’ve been skinned alive once, Lorne. Should I really have to wake up every day knowing that I face that future again if the wrong person wins some political battle back on Earth?”

The Stargate gave a whooping noise and the event horizon vanished. Horror washed through John and he looked up to see some sergeant he didn’t know standing at the controls. Fuck.

Another Lantean was kneeling next to the one John had punched. Thank god he hadn’t killed him. Well, one game was lost, but John still had another to play. He pressed the confiscated P90 to his hostage’s chest. “Go on, take it,” he told him. The airman seemed scared to at first, but then he clutched the weapon and skittered away from John like a rabbit.

John held his hands up in surrender. “The day will come when you regret this, Lorne,” John said.

“Probably,” Lorne agreed.

John looked over at the airman he’d just freed. The man was almost trembling with dark emotions, and he kept his weapon pointed right at John’s gut. “Don’t shoot me. It really hurts, and I was nice enough not to shoot you.” John might have said more, but Ronon’s sense of humor kicked in and he chose that moment to shoot John with his stunner.


	2. Organizing the hive

What’s going on?” John asked, feigning ignorance when Lorne came rushing in. 

“Report to the Gate room for evacuation,” Lorne ordered the two guards.

“Lorne?”

Lorne went over to the wall and deactivated the force field. “We’re leaving the city. We got a new ZPM, and it overloaded some critical systems. Radek is trying to shut it down, but we already lost the north pier. The city is listing to one side and taking on water.

John queried the city and found she had blown an already badly damaged corridor. Flooding was limited to the lower decks, but she was putting on a good show. “So, are you leaving me here to blow up or sink?” John asked.

Lorne hit the release for the bars. “You can gate to wherever you need to go after the last of my people are out. Do not make me regret this.”

John reached out and caught Lorne’s arm. “Tell me what I can do to help.”

Lorne looked conflicted. “Get to medical. They have injured to move and they could use some extra muscle.”

John nodded. “I’m on it.”

John ended up working under Carson’s supervision, moving patients who had been burned and suffered trauma when the North pier blew. Two of the patients waited in the corner with sheets pulled over their heads, but Carson focused on the living first. Ronon showed up as John was carrying heavy monitors and trying to keep up with two nurses who were hurrying a patient down the corridor toward the transporters. They barely had time to nod at each other.

John made two more trips. A couple of soldiers tensed up when they saw him, but then some nurse would call for him to hurry up, and they’d return to their work. John could feel his hive like he never had before. Atlantis sang to the twins, and they sang back. Carried on that strong connection, John could feel Rodney and Todd and Teldy and Mehra. He could feel Dorsey and Stackhouse and Cooper and a dozen others. He could even feel the murmurings of the drones. Home. It felt like home.

With the hive mind so active, John had to focus on his work. Radek had made a connection to the Earth gate, and John helped coordinate the mad push of injured and critical personnel. Woolsey was shoved through, still arguing with Lorne as he vanished into the event horizon. Lorne yelled for Radek to go, and the man answered with a string of Czech curses.

“Overload in the power system!” a tech called, and Radek abandoned the Gate computer to see the numbers. He cursed more as he typed madly. John could feel Atlantis pushing her system to the edge, but she had full control over everything, no matter how out of control it looked. The critical supplies were through, and the ones lining up to go through the gate were ones that John wanted for himself. Atlantis responded to his desire by cutting power to the wormhole.

“Sir! The Gate failed!” The technician sounded panicked, which was reasonable, at least for someone who didn’t realize the entire disaster was smoke and mirrors and one very devious Wraith beauty hiding in the walls of Atlantis. No. That wasn’t right. It was Atlantis herself, turned Wraith the same way John had been.

“Reestablish the connection.” Lorne was clearly losing it if he thought he needed to give that order.

“Radek, what do power levels look like?” John asked.

“Not good.”

John moved to the computer. A couple of the airmen tensed up, but Radek rolled his chair out of the way. “I suppose since you shared brain with Rodney you are now smarter than me like him.”

“Not even close Radek. Lorne, the city is going down, do you mind if I broadcast where we are?”

Lorne moved closer. “To who?”

“Todd has to be close. By now he’s looking for me, so he probably has listener ships out there.”

“And if other Wraith hear it first?” one of the technicians demanded.

John looked over. “I don’t think other Wraith are going to get here before Atlantis is on the bottom of the ocean. Does it matter?”

“We don’t need Todd,” Lorne said. “Step away from the computer.”

John put his hands up and stepped back. “If we can’t get the gate open, we all need another way off the city before she sinks.” John was almost sure Atlantis was enjoying this because she gave a shiver as she let go of one of the anchors. The flooded north side pulled on her, and suddenly the floor was no longer level. Supplied stacked up and waiting for evacuation started tumbling and sliding around the Gateroom.

“Shit. Secure that! Keep clear of any equipment,” Lorne called. Radek was back at his computer.

“It may not matter anyway. City has emergency protocols. Is blasting distress signal for everyone to hear,” Radek said.

John hadn’t thought of that. Luckily Atlantis had. 

“Todd will come. I know it,” John said. “He has never wanted war with Atlantis. He can pick us up and he will let all of you transfer over to the Daedalus when she comes.”

“You haven’t seen him in two years. How do you know what he’ll do?” one of the techs demanded.

“Because I’ve been in his mind with him. He will want me back, and he will not go to war with Earth unless there’s some really big prize in it for him.”

“Like millions of people he can eat?” This guy was annoying John.

“First, no one Wraith could eat that many people. Second, those who are like me can feed Todd just fine. He doesn’t need humans for food.”

Lorne ignored both of them. “Reestablish the worm hole.”

Radek shook his head. “We don’t have power. I can dial in the Pegasus galaxy, but we cannot get to Earth.”

Lorne closed his eyes, and John had one of those moments where the jigsaw that was his brain didn’t quite fit together. He knew he should feel guilty, but he didn’t. This was necessary. If Todd didn’t show Wraith an escape from the trap they were in, they would destroy humans with their greed and then starve. Neither species would survive. That was the larger picture.

“Command staff to the conference room!” Lorne shouted over the general din in the Gate room. A number of people started moving their way through the crowd to the stair. John waited until they had all gone into the conference room and chosen their seats before he wandered after them and leaned against the edge of the door. Someone in the room was trying to shut the door, but Atlantis ignored the mental command.

Other than a few odd looks, most people ignored John as Lorne started the meeting. Alpha site had limited resources. A recent storm had put finding a new Alpha site on the priority list, but it hadn’t happened. One man suggested the Genii. Another recommended the Hoff homeworld, which had shelter and might have some surviving canned food. Most of their supplies had gone through to Earth, and people weren’t quite sure what they had left.

Desperation led to a hasty decision to turn to the Genii. Lorne quickly drafted the evacuation plan with warriors going first in order to keep the Genii from simply grabbing the coveted scientists and taking off. Ronon and Teyla would go first in the hopes of some quick negotiation with Ladon.

John grieved at the loss of those two, but Pegasus was a small galaxy and he could find them again. Perhaps it was even better this way because if Ronon were brought onto the hive ship with everyone else, he would be able to whip the marines up for a fight.

 

 

 

 

“Lorne, we don’t have time for this,” John shouted. “Tell Radek to lower the shield and let Todd beam us out of here.” John knew that much of the fear and noise was created by the ultralow frequencies that Atlantis was generating, but he could still feel his heart beat faster as the general atmosphere of panic battered at him.

Lorne grimaced, the decision clearly paining him. He could order his people blow up with the city or he could lower the shields and let a Wraith take them. Of course, John could have Atlantis lower the shields, but he didn’t.

Eventually Lorne made the right choice. He turned to Radek. “Lower the shields,” he called. Radek hurried to comply, and John could feel the last barrier between him and his hive dissolve. Almost immediately, John was on the deck of one of Rodney’s beautiful twins. And Todd stood there, looking at him with a fondness that made John ache for a touch.

Todd had missed him. He moved to John’s side and pressed his curled fingers against John’s temples as they reconnected. John had not realized how worn and tattered the web in his mind had become until it all rushed back to him. He closed his eyes and swayed on his feet as he found himself inside the hive. 

Rodney mentally pushed in, and John squinted as the brightness of his mind filled John’s awareness. Rodney’s body followed shortly after, and he pushed between John and Todd, closing his eyes as he wallowed in the first feeling of right he’d had since John left. Todd felt bemused at the idea that their separation had been long. He expected them to live for hundreds of years, so this was no more than a moment’s diversion.

John ignored Todd and wrapped his arms around Rodney’s brightness until the space between them vanished and they became one. Mehra came in the room and moved to rest her hands against John’s back, joining their mental embrace, and then Teldy followed. After that, the warrior seeded with their green markings followed, one after another reaching in to touch John, as he opened himself to the whole. John could feel the need of the children to join with him, but Todd didn’t want to expose them to the humans, not yet. They could meet them later when they were better able to understand the difficult relationship between Todd’s hive and the humans. 

John’s own need to touch the children and see their future evaporated under the need to keep them away from the humans.

Todd was the first to step back, pulling his being away from the hive. That was like allowing a crack of light into the darkness, and slowly they all searched out their own thoughts and withdrew from the hive mind. John looked over and Lorne was still watching.

“Radek!” Rodney said, joy in his voice.

“Yes, yes. We need to try and stop the city from blowing up.”

Rodney was suddenly all business and he hurried to the control panels, and Radek followed. “What did you do to my city?” Rodney demanded.

“Your city? If it is your city, why were you not there?”

“Because your people wouldn’t let me in.”

“They are not my people. If anyone had asked me, I would have said yes to the truce.”

“Well they’re more your people than my people.”

Radek muttered about how illogical Rodney had been and how much he had not missed that. The whole time he radiated such joy and love that it almost felt like he was already inside the hive. John smiled as he felt Rodney’s unvarnished delight as he realized that Radek really did like him as much as Rodney always suspected.

“You missed them,” Lorne said quietly.

If John were a cartoon villain or a Genii, this is where he would confess everything. He was neither.

“To be ripped out of the hive mind is to suffer pain every single day,” John said. 

Lorne cringed. 

“It doesn’t matter now,” John said. “Rodney?” For the first time, John looked around. The ship was beautiful. She sang, and John could feel every system through that song. She had found Atlantis’ system, and the city called back joyfully. He blinked and tried to see it as a human would. The lines were Ancient with wide spaces that would not be found in a Wraith ship. The floors were metal, no organics to need constant repair. The walls, however, were covered in organics. In places the covering was thin, almost transparent so the Ancient metal below was visible. Other places the Wraith conduits were thick. Their living lines made the ships’ hard angles look softer, more inviting. She was home.

“Systems are critical. I can’t fix it from here. I might be able to do something in Atlantis.”

“No,” Todd said firmly, playing his part in the drama.

“But the city will blow up,” Radek argued.

“I would rather lose a city I never owned than a Rodney I value,” Todd pointed out. Even if it was one more scheme, Rodney still felt a flush of pride when he realized that Todd meant it, even if Atlantis had been on the verge of exploding.

John felt her discharge a huge cloud of debris over her shield even as she repaired the north tower ballast tank and started pumping water out to get herself back on an even keel. The Wraith DNA gave her an ability to control herself she had never had before and she was already starting on repairs while sending out false readings.

“If the stardrive explodes…” Radek let his words trail off.

“The exploding Stargate is going to bathe the whole area with radiation,” Rodney finished for him. “Break orbit, get us distance from the planet as fast as possible!”

“Rodney?” John asked, keeping his expression confused. The Atlantis released a series of fullierium threads into the cloud of flammable gases and metal dust that was now floating around her.

“We need to get more distance,” Rodney said. He threw himself out of one chair and into another. 

Todd moved quickly to the helm and started piloting the ship away. “Shields to the rear quarter,” he ordered. If any of the others thought about it too much, they would have to ask why a telepathic species would talk. However, he could only sense a desperation and grief from the few people Todd had beamed onto the control deck. The rest of the Atlanteans were in the hold of the ship, blind to the fact that they were about to get cut off from any chance of rescue from earth.

The twins and Atlantis synced their systems. Atlantis set the cloud around her on fire and blasted out a set of fake readings. The twins took those readings and then shook the ships so hard that everyone except Todd was thrown to the ground. Atlantis was dead. Long live Wraith Atlantis, John thought. Amusement rippled through the hive. Even Atlantis sounded amused as she prepared to move location and sink herself under the waves. Behind she left a cloud of radiation that would kill any human. The Daedalus might come, but they wouldn’t find anyone to rescue.

 

 

 

“How many of you transported up?” 

“I’m not sure,” Lorne said. “At least a hundred.”

Atlantis would never answer their calls or allow them to connect a Stargate to her again. She belonged to Pegasus. She belonged to Todd.

“What will happen to us?” Lorne had his gaze locked on a point on the far wall, but he couldn’t hide his emotions as easily as he could control his body. They stained the air with fear and pain and guilt. John knew all those emotions intimately. If Lorne were seeded, he would understand how pointless they were, but John also understood the need to have more than one chess game active on the board at once.

He felt Todd’s amusement at having finally taught John some patience.

“Evan,” John said softly. Lorne looked over at him. They had fought together so often that John had an almost hive-love for this man. He could read his emotions, and he grieved that he could not give Evan the gift of forgiveness without the seeding. Human words were not strong enough for real feelings to travel in such an imperfect way. “Todd’s hive must become a true blending.”

“So I’ll be seeded?” Lorne asked. The fear spiked, but there was also a resignation there.

“You are worthy of the honor, but it is time for Todd to learn to ask first,” John said before he looked over at Todd. The Wraith was very amused by the show. All those who had been seeded were well aware of this. Lorne, however, looked confused.

“Ask? So I have a choice?”

“Yes,” John said.

“And if I say no?” Lorne was too smart to believe there would be no consequences.

“Then you’re a security problem,” John said. “Clearly we have technology that we would prefer humans not know about.”

“So, I have a choice, but if I don’t choose the seeding, you’ll kill me?” Lorne asked. John had implied as much, but he needed Lorne to feel the noose around his neck before John offered a way out. Mercy was of no use unless it inspired gratitude.

“No,” John said. “You would be a prisoner, confined to one deck that has limited technology. You would wear a monitor that Rodney designed that would alert all of us if you tried to access a forbidden area or any computer interface. You would remain onboard until such time as we can connect with a human ship, at which time we would offer you a chance to transport over.”

Lorne frowned. “What human ship would we contact out here? Travelers?”

It surprised John that Lorne would think that way. “Won’t your SGC send their ships to investigate—to find survivors? Your people fled. Surely the SGC will want to gather them up again. We will keep our sensors calibrated to search for the energy signatures of Earth vessels.”

“The city is gone, the planet irradiated. They won’t know where to look, and it’s a big universe. What if you never find one of those ships?”

“Then you can live out your life with others of your kind knowing that you will never be sent off to a planet where you will be dissected. It is more mercy than your people offered me.” John’s bluntness made Lorne blush. He knew John had been treated poorly.

Rodney snorted. “Just get the monitors and lock him in already. None of them have the good sense to make the right choice.”

“Did you choose this for yourself, McKay?” Lorne demanded.

John felt the memory rise up. Rodney was hanging from the rack, old and withered. John cupped his face and leaned close. “Please, Rodney. Please, just give him what he wants.” John begged Rodney to break, to give himself up to Todd, not because he believed it was the right thing but because he wanted to spare Rodney pain. He wanted to save himself the pain of watching. Todd moved closer. “Do this and both your pain will be eased,” Todd promised. He reached up and ran his hand over John’s head and looked down at him fondly. At that moment Rodney had realized that Todd was fond of them. He liked John and he was trying to help them. It was a sick and twisted sort of help, but there was no malice in it. Maybe the enzyme Todd had already pushed into him made him see that, but it was no less true.

Rodney rolled his eyes at Lorne. “I’m the only one smart enough to understand Todd was trying to help. So yes, I did choose this. Now John? That idiot made Todd skin him alive.”

“Hey, I was mourning you. I wasn’t thinking straight at the time,” John complained.

“You should have been smart enough to follow my lead.” Rodney’s exasperation was familiar. John wrapped his arm around Rodney’s waist and pulled him close enough to kiss. It distracted Rodney so that kaleidoscope of his thoughts slowed. 

Todd chuckled. Maybe other Wraith would dislike the noise of human thoughts, but he remembered decades in a Genii cell with too much silence. He enjoyed them. His sons would grow up on a hive where human thoughts were normal, and they would come to value them.

John looked over at Lorne. “You’ve known me long enough to know what the change does and doesn’t do. I’ve never outright lied to you.”

“But you’ve misled me, haven’t you?”

Lorne was not dumb. “Often,” John agreed. “You are not hive, and I do not want my flaws and secrets on display for one who is not hive. Were you to join hive, I would open myself to you without reservation.”

“I prefer to stay human.” Lorne shifted almost as if he was bracing himself. He didn’t expect his choice would be honored.

John nodded. “I respect that choice. You will not be seeded. However, you will obey the rules and understand that you are a prisoner. When I make this offer to some of the others, you will not tell them lies to try and discourage them or allow others to, either. If you want to convince them to refuse me, you will have to use the truth.”

“You can’t think that people will agree to be seeded, do you?”

“I think that Atlantis always had more than its share of people who like to stand at the edge of the universe and look out into the nothing,” John answered. Lorne had never been one of those people, but others were. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

John stopped the second he spotted the familiar shape waiting in the small room. A full Wraith drone stood on the side, his mind respectful of the one who would be hive. “Carson,” John said, relieved that he had come through their drama unscathed.

Carson turned, and a smile lit his face when he spotted them. “John. And Rodney. Oh lad, it is good to see you.” Immediately, he moved to John, hugging him without reservation.

Before John could say anything, Rodney started. “Considering that you’re a bone-rattling practicer of pseudo-science, I’ve missed having your illogical conclusions around,” Rodney said. The words were still Rodney, but John could now see the affection and longing clinging to every word.

“Oh Rodney. Come here,” Carson moved forward and caught Rodney up in a hug so fast that Rodney didn’t have time to retreat. John could feel the hum of not-hive under his skin, so he could imagine that it felt even worse for Rodney. Still, Rodney stood still and even wrapped his own arms around Carson after a time. 

When Carson pulled back, he had tears in his eyes. “I’m sorry I couldn’t find a way to cure ya. I tried. You have to believe I tried, Rodney.”

“I knew you would,” Rodney said. John could feel Rodney’s sorrow that Carson hadn’t come to appreciate the seeding. “But you have to know I’m better now—happier, healthier.”

“Maybe you are, but you’re less Rodney.”

“No, I’m not. Hey, I can insult Todd’s stupidity for leaving John alone for two years if you want me to prove I still have my sharp tongue.”

Maybe you do, but the Rodney I know never would have allowed his friends to be changed against their will

“Hey, people are stupid. I never trusted people to make good decisions, and that goes twice for John.” Rodney sent a flash of apology through the hive, and John sent amusement back. He was well aware of the fact that Rodney had always worried that John was too military—too quick to shoot things. They’d lived in each other’s thoughts long enough that insults no longer had any power.

Carson frowned. “You must remember the horror you felt, the fear of being changed or of watching John be hurt.”

Rodney shrugged. “Yes, but I have more information now, and the change is the most reasonable solution. It prevents the Wraith from being mindless predators. Todd now sees humans as potential hive mates. It makes him more willing to consider other points of view. And it makes me stronger.”

“Oh Rodney.” Carson retreated several steps.

“You have to see how logical it is. Carson, the cloned DNA in your body is breaking down faster than it should, so you would gain more than anyone. Wraith DNA is amazingly hardy, and it can stabilize the human DNA. If you allowed the seeding, you would be stronger. You would have an even longer life than the human Carson would have had.”

“But that’s not what I want,” Carson said softly.

“But that doesn’t make sense!” Rodney’s frustration stained the air.

“What doesn’t? That I would choose to have a shorter life as a human?”

“Yes. That makes no sense.” Rodney was getting angry now.

“It’s my choice,” Carson said. So clearly Lorne was trying to play it straight with the rules of his captivity. He’d told the prisoners that they’d be given a choice, only now an uncomfortable silence filled the air. Carson looked from one of them to the other, and slowly he seemed to shrink in on himself.

John felt the Rodney’s regret hit the hive so hard that they all could feel the shadow of it.

“Or maybe it isn’t,” Carson said softly. “However, that won’t change the fact that I canna approve of giving over one’s humanity to a Wraith.”

Rodney reached out for him. “Carson, this makes sense.”

Instead of taking Rodney’s hand, Carson took another step backward. “I don’t doubt you see it that way.”

“If you don’t join the hive, what can you do? Go back to earth? They told everyone that Carson Beckett died, so they won’t even let you live on Earth.” Rodney kept flailing for more words, for the right words to convince Carson of the logic here, but twinned to that desperation was frustration at trying to communicate through words, which were never meant to carry such important ideas. It was like trying to explain music to a deaf man.

“There are other places to live. I could follow Teyla and Rodney. I doubt they’ll stay with the Genii long, but they’ll find some safe haven.”

“No place is safe when there are Wraith that would cull every planet out there,” John warned him. Teyla and Ronon could take care of themselves, but John wouldn’t allow Carson into that battlefield. He didn’t have the right skills to survive.

“How is what you’re considering any different?” Carson asked, and John felt a wave of anger that Carson couldn’t see the difference. Todd was saving more than himself—he was saving both races. And yet humans insisted that it was better to worship some genetic purity than to save two sentient species. Todd had seen other realities where unadulterated Wraith had reached Earth. They’d bred up into incredible numbers, far more than ever existed during the Alterian war. And after humans were not just defeated but eradicated, the Wraith were starting to turn on each other. The Alterian foolishness had destroyed both their peoples.

Todd would avoid those realities. He would find a new path, one where neither human nor Wraith vanished, but they lived together. But John couldn’t explain all that to someone not in the hive mind.

“Because you would live,” Rodney answered Carson’s question.

“Some part of me would, yes. However, there are parts of that would no longer exist. My emotions would no longer be my own.”

“Carson,” John said in a soft warning. He couldn’t stand by while Rodney felt more and more despair.

Carson looked at him. “Well then, suppose the matter is settled. Don’t worry, I’m not going to throw a fit like a child.”

John wrapped his arm around Rodney and gave him a one-armed hug. “Why don’t you go show Radek the engines?” John didn’t hide any part of his concern or protectiveness. He didn’t want Rodney around Carson, not now. They would have time together after Carson had stopped trying to make Rodney feel guilty for making the most logical choice in front of him.

Rodney hesitated, not wanting to flee the situation, but he relented quickly. He understood John’s concern and sent back a confidence in his choices, a reassurance that Carson wouldn’t make him feel bad. However, Rodney agreed that John could best handle the situation. “Carson, I’ll see you later?”

“I suspect you won’t see me as I am now,” Carson said.

John gave Rodney a mental push as the same time he moved his arm. Rodney headed out to find Radek. John was still getting to know the ship, the larger of the two twins Rodney had designed and then grown. Rodney barely spared him a thought as he guided John’s mind to the internal lifesign detectors and showed him how to differentiate individuals. Immediately Radek’s position lit up on John’s internal map of the ship. John acknowledged the information. The ship didn’t have the same sort of personality that Atlantis did, but he could feel something alive slide through his mind.

John focused back on the current problem. “Carson,” John said.

Carson sighed. “Oh lad.”

“You know how much stronger I am. You’ve seen it.”

“Aye, and I know how much you fought the change.”

John shrugged. “I fight all change. Hell, O’Neill had to basically tell me that I had to go to Atlantis or he was going to make my life miserable. Elizabeth had to order me to take command after Sumner. I’ve spent my whole life fighting change.”

“Some change should be fought.”

“Are you going to fight?” John asked. He hoped not because he didn’t want to hurt his friend. Carson had offered him comfort when few had on Atlantis.

Carson chuckled, but there was little humor in the sound. “I’m a realist. In case you’ve forgotten, I was already Michael’s prisoner for a good long time, and I know what comes of starting a fight you have no chance to win.”

“You’ll be grateful after the seeding.”

“I have no doubt of that,” Carson admitted.

John inched closer, and this time Carson didn’t retreat as he had with Rodney. He just watched with a sad expression. John said softly, “We just want to protect you, to bring you into the hive.”

“And I dinna doubt that for a second. Your heart’s in the best place, and I will believe that until the day I die,” Carson said. He raised his hand and slowly brought it up to rest it on John’s arm. The touch had that stain of not-hive in it, but it was also welcome. This was Carson.

“Because of the seeding, that won’t happen for years—probably for centuries,” John said, holding out his best incentives for Carson to agree. He didn’t want to take Carson by force.

“Oh, I think I’ll die a good sight sooner, but don’t you worry about me. I suppose it’s right that if I was born in Michael’s hive that I die in this one.”

John knew that Carson would die in their hive, but not for centuries yet. However, there was no way for him to convince Carson. That was okay. He’d understand after the seeding. “We should go. Todd’s waiting.”

Right then, mustn’t keep him waiting.” Carson raised his chin a fraction of an inch and headed out the door. He leaked so much regret and soft forms of mourning that John thought the ship echoed it back at them as they walked down the hall. It made him ache, even at this time of joy.

 

 

 

Radek peered at one of the control readouts. “This is… amazing.”

Rodney preened under the praise. The twins were his glory. Everything he knew about Earth, Alterian, Asgard, and Wraith technology was all here in one glorious battleship. “It is, isn’t it?”

“Very much. Only the venting ducts—wrong diameter,” Radek said, pointing toward one part of the specs now displayed on the screen.

For a second, Rodney couldn’t even form an answer. The ship was perfect. How dare Radek suggest otherwise. “They are not.”

“Too narrow.”

“Wider ducts makes for more vulnerabilities in the system.”

“Narrow means blockages, back up of gasses during heavy use.”

“Are you questioning my engineering abilities?”

Radak poked a finger in his direction. “Only your mathematics when it comes to fluid dynamics.”

“You envious little Czech.”

Radek let fly a series of curses, and Rodney was on the verge of being truly annoyed when he let himself feel the air around him. Radek radiated a pure happiness with every curse—the faker.

“My math is perfect, and so is my ship,” Rodney said firmly. He wasn’t going to let Radek get him worked up. He could feel John’s amusement skitter through his thoughts. Yes, yes, so he probably was going to let Radek get to him later, but right now he needed to focus.

“Perfect? Is yet to be seen,” Radek said. “She is beautiful.”

Rodney ran his hands over the display. He’d planned her, designed her with his own seed. She’d been born out of his body. John’s seed could transform control crystals, but Rodney was the only one who could give birth to a ship. He could press the genetic instructions out through his hand slits and slowly feed the organism as it grew into the shapes he chose—and he was far too smart to choose a living creature as the heart of his children. “Yes, she is.” An awkward silence fell. Rodney knew how to exist within the hive mind, but apparently that didn’t improve his communication with other humans.

Radek eventually turned and looked at him. “So are you going to offer the change or are we going to sit here and talk nothing?”

Rodney’s brain had a small blackout, and he could feel the shock from the other others reverberating in his mind. “What?”

“You come to offer the change, yes?”

Rodney had no idea what he was supposed to say. Todd and John urged him to go for the truth, but Rodney was scared. He didn’t want Radek to look at him with condemnation the way Carson had. He couldn’t take that from his best friend. “Maybe,” he finally settled on.

Radek snorted. “This change, it does not improve your conversation skills.”

“Well excuse me for being caught a little off guard.”

“Why?”

Again, Rodney’s brain had a miniature blackout. “Why am I off guard? I don’t know, maybe because everyone acts like this is a horrible thing even if it’s really not.”

“I am scientist.” He shrugged. “I deal in evidence. Miko and I discussed it at length. Sheppard is different emotionally, so the change has an effect on personality, but he was still the man with crazy plan to take on whole hive ship alone just to protect Atlantis, so maybe not so different.”

“Exactly. We’re not that different.”

“But with Wraith DNA, biological imperatives would be different,” Radek continued. Clearly he had thought about this at some length. “Carson said that reproductive organs were compromised, so no children, but I do not much like children. You can still think, so I would be able to carry on with science, but would have new tools. And now when IOC is ready to tell everyone how to do science so that it brings most money, this might be more interesting research.”

“Very interesting research. Todd has a dozen different Ancient facilities that he’s hidden away, and we have ZPMs.”

“Yes, I guess as much. Too much power here for Wraith generators. Very inefficient.”

“Exactly!” Rodney threw his hands up in the air. “Wraith are inefficient on their own, but humans are too fragile. Human equipment and bodies break. But together, we can create something strong enough to stop Wraith from culling humans to extinction.”

“Extinction would be very bad because without an ability to give birth to human children, you will always need humans to become hive members. Do you also need to convert Wraith?”

“No, we can make full-blooded Wraith, and we do with drones because it’s faster, but we don’t need many Wraith warriors around.”

“And are Wraith happy to not have many Wraith around?” Radek asked, his tone suddenly much more serious.

“You’re asking if Todd plans on having a bunch of Wraith babies, and the answer is no. They’re competition for him. We’re not.”

“So is beneficial for him to have more human hybrids than Wraith.”

“Exactly. The others aren’t looking at this logically. Logically, Todd has more reason to protect humans now. Our mutualistic relationship is a good thing.”

“Commensalism at least,” Radek said. John was suddenly there, sifting through Rodney’s memories for the definition. “Is not a bad thing. Is a different thing, and as a scientist, different is interesting.”

“Are you saying you’ll do it?” Rodney couldn’t breathe. He had too much hope and too much fear all stuffed in his chest at once. If it weren’t for the comforting presences of John and Todd, he would have had a heart attack.

“The seeding? Ano,” he said as easily as if he was agreeing to go out for coffee. “I decided that months ago when Miko and I broke out the vodka after Colonel Sheppard drove off the other hive. We did not think Todd would be so easy to defeat, so we thought that when he came, we might end up like you because we have brains that are efficient, even if we do not live up to your standard.”

Maybe it was John’s influence, or more likely Mehra or Teldy, but he felt a need to step forward and grab Radek’s hand. “You’ve always lived up to my standard, Radek.”

Radek leaned forward and peered into Rodney’s eyes. “Did you just compliment me? World is ending. Now I question whether you are pod Rodney.”

Rodney jerked his hand away. “Okay, that’s just stupid. I take it back. You don’t live up to my standard.”

“See, that is the Dr. Rodney McKay I left my home world to work with. Smartest man in two galaxies, or so he tells me over and over.”

“Wait until you join the hive mind. Then you’ll see. I am the smartest man.”

“No, you are part of hive now, so would that not mean that John knows all you do? That would make him the smartest man too. You cannot have two smartest men.”

“Now you’re just annoying me.”

“Yes,” Radek agreed. “And I am enjoying it.”

Rodney started toward the door, and Radek followed without even a hint of concern. Well, not more than a hint, and Rodney didn’t blame him for feeling a little concern about such a big step. The important thing was that Radek was willing to follow him. Radek trusted him that much. “Wait.” Rodney stopped at the door. “You said you and Miko had talked. What did Miko decide?”

“She was more quick to say she would join your hive that I was. I had to think. She said she would follow you if she had a choice.”

“Really?”

Radek rolled his eyes. “The woman thinks you are perfect. Very flawed judgment.”

“You’re just jealous that no one is volunteering to follow you,” Rodney said, but he couldn’t keep the grin off his face. They were his people. In the labs, they had always been his people and now they were choosing to follow him. Rodney felt a joy so intense that it made it hard to breathe.

“I do not need followers.”

“Good because you don’t have them,” Rodney said because that’s what he was supposed to say. They complained to each other, that was their thing. But Radek trusted him, even without the hive mind. Radek actually trusted him.

“You are a petty, petty man,” Radek accused him, but he also put his hand on Rodney’s arm, and it didn’t feel wrong. It was like part of Radek was already hive.

 

 

 

 

 

 

John waited until Elliott was closest to the door before he opened it. All the humans came to their feet, and the room was a strange mix of fear and resignation and resentment. Elliott projected caution, but no outright fear.

“Sheppard,” Lorne said. He separated from the group and moved forward, just like a good officer.

“Colonel,” John said with a nod. “I thought you and Elliott might enjoy a walk—a chance to get out of these rooms. You two were always kind enough to give me a chance to stretch my legs.” 

Elliott looked at Lorne, clearly hoping he would say yes. She was full of energy with no outlet. John could see the moment Lorne realized the reason for the invitation. At least Lorne was smart enough to know he didn’t have a real choice in the matter. He nodded his head and moved toward the exit. John stepped to one side to let him pass.

“Colonel!” one of the other called out. 

Lorne looked back. “I’ll be fine, Garrison.” He didn’t say the same of Elliott. John smiled and gestured for her to go ahead of him.

John led them to an observation deck. To Wraith eyes, spaces without life looked wrong—barren and wrong. Space was ugly. However, those with more human eyes could still appreciate the wonder of a field of stars or a solar flare rising from the corona of a sun. Rodney had left this one observation window for that purpose. Lorne moved up to the window and let his hands trail over the clear metal. “She’s Ancient made.”

“She’s Rodney’s,” John corrected him. The twins might have a spine made of Ancient technology, but their flesh had been born from Rodney—literally. He had planned their every turn. He had genetically programmed their seeds, he had pushed them out through the slits in his hands and had used his mind to guide the growing ships. Rodney had always considered Atlantis his, and she was, but these ships were literally born from him, of his flesh and blood.

Lorne turned around. “So, this is where you make your offer.” He turned and looked at Elliott. She didn’t know what was going on because she just looked from one of them to the other, clearly confused.

“Sirs?”

John smiled. “I made Lorne an offer, which he refused. He could have left the prison level, explored the ship, gone on missions and adventures with us. He could have stood at my side an equal, and he chose the prison level.”

Lorne rolled his eyes. “The bullshit is a little thick, even for you, Sheppard. You offered to infect me with an alien virus that would dissolve many of my human organs and then grow Wraith parts in the open hole. You offered to let me have a Wraith invade my mind and take over my lower brain functions.”

“I offered to make you powerful.”

“You offered to turn me into a slave.”

John frowned. “That is a lie, and you gave your word you would not lie to convince someone to reject us.”

Lorne sat on the bench and looked down at the Wraith cuff that was fused to his wrist. “Sheppard, this is a leash. This bit of living tissue is used to control me. Now look at your back. Look at the Wraith tissue wrapped around the base of your brain and the emotional centers, and tell me you aren’t as much a prisoner here as I am. I’ll call you a liar.”

“Your uniform and your rules—they control you. When was the last time you were honest with yourself about what you wanted? How much of your life is limited by your uniform? At least my rules and regulations come with a hive that understands every pain and fear and can help protect me. Yours are cold words in a book, but you follow them. They order you to lock a fellow officer in a cage twenty-two hours a day, and you follow them. If Caldwell had sent me back to Earth for dissection, would you have lifted a finger or would you have put the restraints on me like it was any other day for my walk and shower and then delivered me to the Gate room to be taken off to my execution? You don’t get the moral high ground here.”

“You admitted it, Sheppard. Todd flayed you alive. You went into this screaming and pleading, so don’t pretend it was all roses and choices.”

“I didn’t know what I was going into. Rodney woke up so dazzled by the hive that he couldn’t articulate anything, and I thought my friend was dead. So yes, I demanded that Todd do the seeding right then. I wanted pain. I wanted to die. I wanted to wake up in hell and spend the rest of eternity being ripped to pieces. So yeah, in a way I did choose.”

“Christ, Sheppard, do you even hear yourself? What human do you think would really choose to be what you are?”

John sank down on the bench next to Lorne and he tried to find the right words—not to convince Lorne, although he would like that—but to convince Elliott. She was uncertain and leaking stress scents.

“I can’t explain to a blind man what it feels like to see. I can’t explain to you how it feels to suddenly perceive the world more clearly, to share thoughts with people you love, to know the depth of their feelings. I was in that cell for almost two years, and you kept expecting me to give up on Todd, but I have been inside Todd’s head. I know how he feels about me, and I had absolute faith that he would come, and he did.”

“Because you’re his property,” Lorne said.

“I know how much he values me, not just as another pair of hands to do the work around here, but as John Sheppard. He values Rodney and his quicksilver mind. He values Mehra and her sharp insight and Teldy and her strength and determination. He values Dorsey and his circumspect nature. He values Stackhouse’s absolute loyalty and Dr. Porter and her insatiable curiosity. For the first time in my whole life, I know I am wanted and I understand how to work with others, because we’re here in each other’s heads.”

“I don’t want anyone in my head,” Lorne said firmly.

“And that is why you are so alone and isolated. That is why humans annoy each other when they are too close together for too long. Your words can’t carry the important ideas they need to, and you cannot share.”

Lorne narrowed his eyes. “Are you going to tell Elliott why we’re having this conversation?”

John smiled. “I think she knows. She’s conflicted, and I’m going to ask that she not make any decision until tomorrow.”

“She’s not going to join your team, Shep.”

John gave an elaborate shrug. “Maybe, maybe not. But I respect her, and I would like to know what her logical mind would feel like against mine. I like her enough to invite her in, and there are entirely too few of your people that I feel that way about.” John turned to look at Elliott. “If you have any questions, I will answer them honestly or tell you that I will not answer. I won’t lie.”

She looked over at Lorne.

“He’s a good officer, if he had time to coach you, he would tell you to get as much information as you can, right, Colonel?”

“Yes,” Lorne said stiffly.

“So let’s hear it. What questions do you have?”

“How much of your free will can Todd override?”

“Wow. Straight to the hard questions,” John admired that. “He can make me feel what he likes—fear, joy, pain, fatigue. Right now, he could drive me into a frenzy of rage and fear. However, I am still me, so I would know that those emotions were unreasonable, and I would resent the hell out of him for manipulating me. He would then be forced to feel my frustration and annoyance. There’s a checks and balances system between us.”

Lorne stood. “I knew Colonel Sheppard for four years. There’s no way he would ever accept someone emotionally manipulating him. No fucking way.”

“You didn’t know me at all, Colonel,” John countered. “How much guilt and self-hate do you have going?”

Lorne stiffened, and John could see the answer pour from him like a low-lying fog.

“I had your job for over four years. I sent your team in to retrieve iratus eggs. I piloted the jumper when we left Elizabeth behind. You had that job for six months. I had it for four years. So you take all the self-loathing you have and multiply it by eight. That’s what I was carrying around. Would I have hated Todd for doing this? Sure. But by then, I hated myself a whole lot more. The hive’s ability to emotionally manipulate me is the best thing that ever happened to me. I remember that I once felt so guilty and wrong that I could barely function, but I don’t have the feelings anymore.”

“That’s not…” Lorne grimace. “It’s not right,” he finished.

“It’s better than living the way I was. When Todd did the seeding, I wanted to go to hell. How long could I have carried that much guilt and pain before we had some disaster?”

“You could have come to one of us, gone to Woolsey.”

“No,” John said quietly, “I couldn’t have.”

“So you let a Wraith control your emotions instead.”

John laughed. “Rodney does most of the direct manipulation, and he does it with his usual flair for subtlety. All I have to do is think about Doranda and the way I blamed him, threatened to stop being his friend, and he buries me in feelings of love and acceptance until I would sit on the ground mooneyed and happy while someone shot me. As far as Rodney’s concerned, I’m not allowed to feel guilty, so I have to do guilt in little tiny doses or he catches me.” John held up a finger and thumb to show how little guilt he was allowed.

“I’m not sure Todd has time to manipulate any of us before the rest of us jump all over any pain or guilt or fear and smother it out. Mehra is a bear when it comes to one of us hurting. She’ll come running right into your brain and rip out any of the pain connections and hold them away from you. Teldy is a little more subtle, but she’ll be right in there smoothing out the jagged edges after Rodney or Mehra have done their rough version of comfort. And I have to admit that I spend a lot of time manipulating Rodney, making sure he knows that we love him for more than just his mind. He’s been badly used by a lot of people.”

“And you really think this is okay?”

“I think this is beautiful,” John said. “I’m stronger for having my hive.”

“You’re brainwashed,” Lorne said firmly. There would be no compromise in this one.

John shrugged. “Well then, I like the scent of the soap.”

 

 

 

 

 

John dragged himself to the prisoners’ hall. He could hear them yelling for information for the last two hours, but between the battle and the repairs, he hadn’t had time or energy to spare. The bulk of guiding the drones had fallen on him, Teldy and Mehra. Three strong minds to guide the strategy of hundreds of drones, most of whom were now dead. John closed his eyes and grieved. Drones might not have individual lives, but many of those drones had once been people that he knew—that had served under him—that he had searched for and hoped to rescue.

John was not handling their losses well. Their warrior classes had done much better. Stackhouse had thrown himself into the fight with terrifying abandon, as had Elliott. They were now resting, their bodies worn from the fight and their minds tired because the hive mind as a whole was exhausted. 

John would have crawled into a bed with Rodney and slept, only he could hear Lorne’s shouts. The human fear seemed to sink into the walls of the prisoners’ area.

When John opened the door, he found most of the humans gathered in the main room. For a half second, he thought they were going to try a revolt, but the emotions were wrong for that. They were worried.

“There was a fight,” Lorne said.

John nodded. “We’ve traded protection for human food on three planets. A group of Wraith tried to take one of our planets.”

“A group? Are we still in danger?” Lorne went right for the tactical information. He never stopped being a good officer.

“Five hive ships against our twins. We’re here, they’re not,” John said. He smiled, but the expression faded. “We’re all tired, and we need to rest, so don’t cause trouble, okay?”

Laura Cadman stepped forward. “Do you have anyone to take a watch at controls?”

“Captain, we’re fine,” John said.

“No offense, sir, but you look like you’re ready to fall over. I may not have your senses, but I can watch a board and call if there’s anything suspicious in the sensor readings.”

John hesitated. They didn’t need the help. The twins would alert them far more quickly than any human could spot a problem on the boards, but this was the first Cadman had shown any interest in helping. 

Dr. Branton stepped forward. “I could take a shift too. Your people have provided us food and protection, and I feel a little bad sitting down here while you look like you’re ready to drop from exhaustion.”

John could feel the hive mind sluggishly stir. They were both ones who would be welcome. Todd offered to watch them and make sure they did not sabotage the ship. Rodney offered to eat them if they tried, especially Cadman. He was still annoyed that she had made him kiss Carson in front of everybody. The man had kept his vindictive streak.

“We could use the help,” John said slowly. “Lorne, do you have any objection to Cadman and Branton taking a shift?”

“Do you need a third on that shift?” Lorne asked.

John studied him, but he couldn’t see anything other than a desperate need for information, a need to get out and see for himself that things were the way they were being told. “If you decide it’s your duty to try and sabotage the ship, you’re going to have to deal with Rodney. He’s a lot scarier than Todd, and he doesn’t always like you.”

“I’ll keep that in mind, Sheppard. Right now, I’m just interesting in keeping us all in one piece.”

“And keeping the three planets defended, don’t forget that,” John said. “Idiotic Wraith are strip mining planets of all humanity, and then they’re going to be in deep shit. You’d think one of the queens would be smart enough to figure out this wasn’t going to end well.”

“I don’t usually think of Wraith as being good long-term thinkers,” Lorne said, always ready to get in a little jab. John was too tired to care or argue.

“Okay, you three. I’ll show you the secondary sensor room and give you a quick tour. If you wander past the main hall where the sensor room is, Rodney will come and give you a firm spanking.” John wiggled his eyebrows.

Cadman laughed, like he knew she would. “I’ve been inside Rodney’s brain. He doesn’t do spankings. He does thermonuclear tactical strikes.”

“There is that,” John said. He escorted them up and showed them the various systems before retreating to a room on the next level down. Rodney met him in the hallway, wrapping his arms around John and pulling him into the closest bedroom. 

“You should hibernate,” Rodney muttered.

“So should you,” John said right back, but both of them knew they wouldn’t. Instead they curled up together and conserved as much energy as they could as they linked their mind to the twins. Rodney was testing every repair, checking every inch of his children to see how they’d handled their first battle. The smaller, empty twin had taken some serious damage. Without a crew, she was slow to respond or even understand threats. John was listening to the three prisoners he’d just given access to the twin’s control room. Todd was there too, listening, but that didn’t change John’s desire to make sure he kept an eye on them.

“This is pretty amazing,” Branton said. The coding on this must be intense.”

“Focus on the job at hand,” Lorne suggested.

Cadman answered. “Lighten up, Colonel. This is a chance to do a little snooping. They know we’re looking, so it can’t hurt to see what they’re willing to let us see. Ohhh. I see big rail guns. Momma like. Holy crap, this baby has enough firepower to take on a couple of goa’uld mother ships. This is definitely a Rodney McKay special.”

“Captain, keep it quiet. And don’t believe everything you see. They gave us access to this system, so we can’t assume it is accurate—any of it.

I don’t see why they’d lie. Face it, if they wanted to keep us prisoner forever, they could

Maybe they’re waiting for us to all volunteer for the seeding,” Branton said. “I get bored enough that some days I wonder if it wouldn’t be better than sitting around and watching Captain Toole picking his toenails.

“Oh god, don’t bring that up,” Cadman said. “That man is getting on my last nerve. Hell, I’ll do a shift cleaning out the head to avoid him.

“Captain,” Lorne warned again. John suspected that she was annoying as many people as Toole.

Branton interrupted them. “Hey, this looks like a battle review.”

John sent out a mental query and the twin showed him the file Branton had just accessed. Rodney’s awareness slid over to him for a second. “He found that. He’s good. Why isn’t he with us?”

“Because we’re trying to teach Todd to play nice with others,” John said. Rodney snorted and pointed out that humans weren’t bright enough to choose the option that would save their own hides. Todd agreed, amusement in his thoughts.

“You two are mercenary. I’m stuck between the two most mercenary thinkers in the universe,” John complained softly. However, neither pushed at him to change his course, so John watched their trio.

“They took heavy losses,” Cadman said, and all the humor had vanished from her voice. She was right.

“Not as heavy as the other side,” Lorne said. “Five hive ships gone. That’s impressive.”

“Colonel, I’m not sure they have the crew to survive this sort of attrition,” Cadman said. “Todd lost all his crew before we even took Atlantis back to the Milky Way. He hasn’t had time to rebuild his forces.”

That was only partially true. John’s seed was specialized for infiltration and infection and Rodney’s and Radek’s toward ship seed. Todd could not give them all the powers of a queen, so he chose the ones that would matter in their hive role. That meant that Teldy and Mehra had Wraith reproductive seed. They could use external pods to grow drones in a matter of weeks. However, drones were workers. They needed warrior minds. They needed more like Dorsey and Stackhouse and Elliott, not mindless drones. They could birth warrior Wraith, but that came with more hunger and other problems. So far, Todd had only agreed to two additional high-level Wraith males.

“If they didn’t have enough people, that would explain why the weapons weren’t firing on all sides. The ship is dangerously under-crewed.” Branton seemed bothered by that.

“We’re here to gather information, not to volunteer to help run their hive.”

Teldy slowly pushed forward. Branton had been hers—her lover. If she watched him, could she have him as hive kin?

It was an option John had thought of long ago while in Atlantis’ prison. Some people had attachments, and they would want mates or children to come with them. Todd wanted humans strong and reproducing, so it would make sense to allow hive kin, not true hive, but humans trusted within the ship because they were kin to hive?

Todd was uncomfortable with the idea, which made the whole hive leery, but Teldy liked it. She could take Branton to her bed again, gain his trust and his help. He would not threaten hive, and if he did, she would deliver him back to Lorne. She respected him, and even if he did not choose hive, she would have his strength adding to the strength of the hive.

Rodney grumbled, but agreed. The others were silent. Finally Todd sent through a sense of resignation that suggested he would yield to his hybrids only because they were too stubborn to act like proper Wraith. John pulled Rodney closer, their limbs tangled as he started to drift off towards sleep, a sliver of his attention still focused on the trio now searching through the battle data. He would care more tomorrow. Tonight he was exhausted.

 

 

 

 

 

John mentally checked with the Twin as he headed toward the human prison level. The ship was beginning to take on her own personality as she grew up, and he suspected that Rodney and Radek were questionable parents because he got an impatient shove and a reminder that she could tend herself. It had been a small battle and the other hive wasn’t even worthy to live in the same galaxy she did. Yep, that was Rodney’s girl.

The ship sent him a wave of affection for that. She then sent through another query about when they would go back to Atlantis. Atlantis was John’s girl, and she missed him. John missed her too, but defending their planets and building up the human population had to come first. Soon they would have enough humans, and they could start bringing the brightest to Atlantis to live and study under the watchful eye of Atlantis.

He opened the locked door and several of the humans rose to their feet. Lorne stepped forward. “Another battle?”

John nodded. “One desperate and starving hive, this time.”

“So, you’re winning?” a sergeant asked.

John considered his answer. The more the human population recovered, the more rogue ships could poach. “We’re not losing,” he settled for. They could track down and eliminate every rogue hive, but Todd firmly vetoed that. He didn’t want his own species eliminated, and right now there were dangerously few true Wraith on their one small ship. “The more the human populations grow and people start traveling again, the more potential victims are out there for rogue hives to grab.”

Lorne grimaced. “I don’t see how this is going to end.”

“We’re growing stronger. The hives are growing weaker. There is only one way for this to end,” John said. Of course, that depended on the rogue hives not finding Earth and hunting grounds rich enough for them to feast and breed up again. Todd suspected that the younger queens lacked the strength of their older sisters and they could not control the hunger of their hive mates. That drove them to hunt like ravenous beasts instead of like the apex predators and tenders of the human flock they were designed to be.

A marine sergeant stepped forward. “Hey, are you going to offer to turn me?” The aggression rolled from him.

John glanced at him and then turned his attention elsewhere. The entire hive had the same general sense of revulsion at the very idea, but it was Teldy who had the life experience to explain the reason. “Why should I?” John asked.

“I’m going buggy in here. Come on, if it gets me out of this room, I’ll play nice with a Wraith,” he offered.

“Sergeant, stand down,” Lorne ordered.

“Colonel, you aren’t exactly in charge here, are you?” the sergeant asked. He liked the idea that someone in power had lost it. It made him reek of twisted pleasure, and John disliked seeing his own second in command placed in such a difficult spot. Well if this sergeant wanted to play power games, John could do that.

“How many people have you raped?” John asked calmly. The room had been fairly quiet before, but now it went utterly still. No one even twitched.

“What?” the sergeant demanded after an awkward silence that all but confirmed Teldy’s suspicions. “I never raped anyone!” He pulled his lips back in a snarl worthy of a Wraith.

John wasn’t intimidated. He stepped closer to this coward who pulled the illusion of strength around himself. “I can see the truth as easily as I can hear your words,” John warned.

The sergeant was breathing heavily. “Fuck you.”

“More than ten or fewer?” John asked, and he could feel the mood in the room shift. Those who had been uncomfortable around this one suddenly understood the source of their discomfort. That was the weakness of humans—they didn’t understand what their poor and incomplete senses were constantly trying to tell them.

“I never raped anyone,” the sergeant said through clenched teeth.

“The thing that’s wrong with you? The hive wouldn’t fix it. You would bring it with you into the hive.”

“There’s nothing wrong with me.” The sergeant was backing away now, desperate to regain some of the power and control he’d just lost rather dramatically.

“You feel so powerless, and that we could help, but you have learned to steal power. To rape. That’s the reason you went into special forces, to gain more power and fill that emptiness in your soul.” It was a guess, but it was one based on John’s understanding of the scents around him and the life experiences of his entire hive. Todd stepped back, watching his human hive-brothers take on this new threat. The undercurrent of hunger was there—Todd could eat this one and remove the danger.

“Fuck you, Sheppard.”

John grinned. “You would like to fuck me, not because you’re attracted to me. No. You aren’t attracted to me sexually. You would just like power over me.”

“Okay, pay your fucking games. I get it. You’re too scared of me to let me out of this cage.” He said that, but he feared that the others could see through his mask now, and from the scents that filled the room, they did. Lorne looked horrified and a little ill. If John cared less for his old second, he would point out that human senses meant that Lorne hadn’t seen the danger and he’d sent an armed rapist out to make contact with unarmed farmers. Who knows how much damaged had been done, and Lorne’s human senses had never even caught a hint of a problem.

“If you had ever served under me, I would kill you for raping people while under my command.”

“I didn’t rape anyone.” He turned to the other humans, looking around the room at the gathering. “Can you believe this guy?” he asked as though this was all a joke.

“They do believe because several of them already had their suspicions.”

He snorted. “Whatever.” He played it off, but John could smell the terror and desperation.

“If you were seeded, that disease could not be allowed to live. You would not be turned as we are, but you would be happy. You would never again feel helpless or powerless, and you would always be sure of your place in the hive, but you would not be you.”

“Fuck off, bug face,” the sergeant snapped.

Lorne stepped forward, catching John’s attention. “What are you talking about that he wouldn’t be himself?”

John studied Colonel Lorne. The man wouldn’t want to hear this, but it was the truth. “He could be a drone. The virus would move into his higher brain function and burn out the need to hurt others and the underlying pain that drives it. He would be happy, but he wouldn’t be himself.”

“You’d lobotomize him? No. That’s too far, Sheppard.”

“Okay,” John said with a shrug as if it didn’t matter to him. “That’s why I warned him before I agreed to a seeding.” John turned and left the humans to deal with the mess he’d just created.

 

 

 

John had no more than opened the door when a too-familiar sergeant nearly leapt at him. John brought his hands up to defend himself, but the sergeant stopped a few feet away. “You! It’s your fault. Half of them fucking believe you.”

John looked around and he could feel the tension and hatred swirling around the room. It spoke well of most of Atlantis’ military that they loathed the idea of a rapist in their midst. “I think that’s your fault for being a rapist,” John pointed out.

“I never raped anyone.”

That was not only a lie, but a stupid one. John could smell the power lust on the sergeant’s skin. “You’re under so much stress that you’re trying to figure out how to rape someone right now. If you do that, I will throw you out an airlock.”

“I’m not… This is a game. We’re just fucking game pieces to you. All pawns at the great Sheppard’s mercy.” The sergeant threw his hands up.

“Sergeant!” Lorne snapped in his most commanding tone.

The sergeant whirled on him. “No. You’re always trying to shut me up, but even before I came to Atlantis, all I ever heard was how great Sheppard was. Sheppard never gave up on you when you were captured. Sheppard was a fucking hero. He rode a fucking nuclear bomb into a hive ship.” He turned back to pin John with a vicious glare. “You’re just one more dickwad, only with bug genes in you.”

“Sergeant Englman!” Lorne was angry now, and John finally had a name to go with their local rapist. Lorne stepped between Englman and John.

“Lorne, it’s okay,” John said. “He needs an outlet for his anger. He can take it out on me safely enough.” He looked at Englman. “Maybe you want to go spar?”

“What? You want to get your bug hands on me? No.”

John shrugged. “Okay.”

“That’s all you’re going to say? You convinced these people that I’m a fucking rapist, and then you lock me in a room with them.”

“You have the entire deck. As prisons go, it’s not a bad one,” John pointed out. They had twenty small rooms and one large communal room and four bathrooms. John would have loved having as much freedom during his time as a prisoner in Atlantis.

“It’s still a prison. And now all the inmates treat me like shit. Me. You’re the fucking asshole who is keeping us in here until we rot. How the fuck is that my fault?”

“You don’t have control of your emotions, so I don’t blame you for them,” John said. He understood that rape came from a place of feeling powerless, and nothing except a whole lot of therapy would change Englman’s feelings. “You must, however, control your actions. You are not allowed to rape anyone, no matter how strong this rage gets. Tell me and I will spar with you or send Mehra down if that would be better.”

He sneered. “Right. You’d send Sergeant Mehra down. Doesn’t that prove that I’m not a rapist? You sure wouldn’t send a woman down if you thought I’d rape her.”

“I wouldn’t send Sergeant Mehra, but Mehra the hybrid can kick your ass. Sparring with her just might drain off some of this energy that is hurting you so much,” John said. It was the only mercy he could offer the man, and even then Todd whispered that it would be better to eat him. John firmly vetoed that. They had no evidence that he had actually acted on feelings, no matter how much John believed he had.

“I’m not hurting,” Englman snarled.

Lorne stepped forward, drawing John’s eye focus to him. No way was that an accident. “Sheppard, we need to find a human ship and get out of here,” Lorne said in an unsubtle change of topics.

“If I knew were there was one in this galaxy, I would agree, but Todd is not going to take a two week trip to earth and then a two week trip home just to soothe your frazzled nerves. Our supply planets are in real danger, and we owe them our protection. Well, that and Rodney is pushing us to leave you down here for two years and three months.”

Lorne had the courtesy to not deny the justice in that. “The length of time you were in Atlantis’ prison,” he said softly.

“Yep. You can say one thing about Rodney, he’s consistently not nice.”

“I thought you smoothed over each other’s rough edges,” Lorne said. The others rarely even spoke to John.

“In Rodney’s case it’s not a rough edge as much as a personality, but under that, he loves so deeply that it almost hurts. It’s his love that drives most of his not niceness. He hates what you did to me because he loves me.”

And that set Englman off again. “You’ll have him with all his arrogance and shitty attitude in your precious hive, but you won’t have me?”

John wanted to point out that Rodney was worth a million of Englman, but it was such an obvious truth that it wasn’t worth saying. He did say, “We will have you, but the seeding will burn away that wrongness in you, and that wrongness is buried too deep in your brain to leave much of your personality left to enjoy the happiness you’d find in the hive mind.”

“So you won’t help me? Fuck you.” Englman turned his back, and Lorne got a pinched expression on his face.

“The seeding is not magic. It can’t fix things, only remove them if they are too damaged to be healthy.”

Englman whirled back around. “Do it,” he said, fear blasting from him, but also a desperate hope. He wanted something different. He didn’t want to keep living in his own skin. It was all laid out on the air around him.

Lorne shouted in a shocked voice, “Sergeant!”

Englman shook his head. “I’m sick of this shit.”

“Sergeant, they’re talking about lobotomizing you. This is not an option.” Lorne moved to stand right in front of Englman.

“Oh, and sitting around here and having the rest of you feel so superior is?” he asked. For someone who felt a lack of power, who already raped in order to cling to some illusion of power, the contempt of his peers was likely a form of torture. Maybe it made John a bad person, but he kind of enjoyed knowing he’d contributed to that agony. Englman was a rapist.

“We’ll talk about this later,” Lorne hissed.

“No. We won’t because I’m saying yes to the seeding.”

“No, you aren’t.”

“Colonel Lorne, you can go fuck yourself because I quit.”

Englman headed for the door, and John didn’t stop him. Mehra was coming down as was Todd. He would get his wish.

Lorne tried to follow, and John caught him by the arm. “Let him go,” John said.

Lorne jerked back. “So you can kill him?”

John raised his chin. This was a sort of execution, and John had mixed feelings about it. Rodney was there, pointing out that Englman had asked for this. John hadn’t chosen for him or even encouraged this choice.

Lorne pulled back and looked at John like he was a piece of shit. “You are. You’re going to kill him. You’re a monster, Sheppard, in more ways than one.”

“And you’re blind,” John said without disagreeing. Rodney could sooth over these rough edges later. “Every one of us could see the pain and wrongness in Englman from the time we saw him. He carries deep damage nearly as old as his soul, and taking power from others is his drug. He was addicted, and you can’t see it because humans are nearly blind to each other.”

“But Wraith are so much better. Give the PR speech a rest, Sheppard. You’re taking that man to die.”

“Yes, but his pain will also die, and the part of him that is left can be happy without having to hurt others. He hates himself for what he does. He hates himself far more than you or I ever managed to. Maybe he just wants to hurt himself to make up for what he’s done. Maybe he doesn’t actually want the seeding at all.”

“Then send him back,” Lorne asked, his tone pleading with John.

“It’s better this way. He was hurting too much, and you can’t deal with his sickness. We can.”

“By essentially killing him? Sheppard. John! This isn’t you.”

“It is now.” John stepped back and the door slid closed. He could hear Lorne pound on it from the other side, but the time for talking was over. Englman had made his choice, and his strength would become the strength of the hive.

 

 

 

 

John sat on the rock and watched as Ronon came down the path. The normal bounce in his step was gone, and he looked older. More tired. John could see the moment that he recognized John because he pulled his weapon and charged it to kill with a whine that John knew too well. As much as John trusted Rodney’s new personal shield, he really did hope Ronon wouldn’t take that kill shot he wanted to.

“Ronon,” John said.

“Where is she?” Ronon demanded.

“You already know the answer to that.”

Ronon stared at him with hatred that made John’s gut ache. 

“She is fine, adjusting to the change but fine.”

“And Torren and Rolhen?” Ronon didn’t ask after Kanaan.

“They are hive-kin, guaranteed a safe place on the ship without taking the change. Kanaan was not even offered the change, and Torren and Rohen are too young.”

That drove the rage in Ronon’s heart to even greater depths. John was starting to think this was not a good idea. Teldy pushed an idea in his head, and John sat up. “They will be offered the seeding if and only if they prove worthy. Otherwise when they are of age, they can choose to stay hive-kin and work the ship, they can go to a protected colony or they can set out on their own. They’re Teyla’s sons, so the last might appeal to them as much as the rest of us would prefer they stay somewhere safe.”

Ronon pulled his lips back into a snarl. “And you expect me to believe that?”

“I’ve never lied.”

“You had something to do with Atlantis falling. You wanted those people, so you destroyed the city you claimed to love, just so you could take them.”

“Atlantis isn’t destroyed,” John said quietly. Ronon was never going to leave this path, so it didn’t matter if he knew their secret. “She was infected and changed. She created most of the sensor readings and allowed a few systems to explode to put on a good show.”

Ronon lowered his gun, but the rage grew darker. “People died, Sheppard.”

“Why aren’t you on the Genii homeworld protecting those who evacuated over there?” John challenged him.

“They aren’t my people,” Ronon snapped, he didn’t say that John had been, but John could see the raw and bleeding emotions.

He slid down off the rock and Ronon brought his weapon up again. “At one point the Satedans were your people. You were taken from them by force, and after a time you found a new people. Loyalties shift, but even after they shift, you can still love the ones you left behind. You can still go back for them.” 

“And when I went back for my Satedan friends, they turned out to be Wraith worshippers, like you.”

John shook his head. “No, I’m not a worshipper. I don’t see the Wraith as gods. They’re creatures not unlike you or me. They were harmed, experimented on, tortured, and they rebelled against their creators. For 10,000 years they were defined by their rebellion and their anger. Todd is just searching for another path.”

“Go back to your Wraith, Sheppard, and stay the hell away from me.”

“Where will you go, Ronon? Teyla, Rodney, me… Radek, Carson… every person you might have turned to is in the hive. I suppose you could go to Jennifer, only she’s back on Earth, and you have no way to get there. You’re alone, Ronon.”

Ronon shoved his gun in its holster, but there was no softening of emotions in him. He had just decided that John was there to talk. “It’s not like I don’t have experience with it.”

“But you shouldn’t be alone. We want you back on the team,” John said.

Ronon grunted and started down the path again.

“You would still be the same crusty, laconic guy we all know and love. This wouldn’t turn you into someone you’re not.” John started keeping pace with Ronon although he stayed at least ten feet out to the side. It meant he had to scramble over rocks and logs, but that was fine.

“Tell someone who might believe your lies.”

“They aren’t lies.”

Ronon stopped and looked at John. “Are you going to tell me that Teyla went willingly?”

“She did,” John said. Ronon’s anger flared red-hot. “Of course at the time we had already taken her family, but we did promise that we would never hurt them, never change them. She came with us to reunite with them, not to save them.”

“And now you think that if you come to me and talk, you can get me to do the same?”

“We already have your family, Ronon. Your whole family is up there on that hive ship. We’re up there, missing you, and we want you to come home.”

John could see the emotions shift. Ronon’s rage broke, and John could see pain leak out from between the cracks. True Wraith could not see this much of human emotion, but the Wraith abilities and the human understanding of emotion had combined to give John and the hybrids this ability to read people, and he pressed his advantage now.

“You once trusted me enough to join Atlantis even though you knew almost nothing about us. Please, Ronon, trust me again. You can find a new home and be with your family again.” For a second, Ronon wavered, but then he patched over his pain with layers of anger that were more brittle than before. He was self-destructing, and John felt a horrible guilt for the pain he’d done this one man, even if he couldn’t feel guilty about betraying his country and species.

“Please,” he begged.

Ronon looked at him. “I can’t,” he said and then he started walking again. 

I can’t—not I won’t or I don’t want to, but I can’t.

“I understand,” John said. Ronon had his hand on his weapon, and he was probably ready to defend himself from John. He didn’t expect the Wraith stunners to fire from three sides, catching him in the center of the crossfire so that he collapsed silently to the ground. “You’ll be okay,” John promised him. Stackhouse, Dorsey, and Teldy dropped down from the trees. Mehra started coming out from the rocks where she’d been watching, and Elliott and three drones followed. In the woods, Todd was still keeping watch on his entire brood, unwilling to risk so many of his hive without being on the ground to protect them himself.

Their radios came to life. They didn’t need to speak, but Rodney never seemed to lose the habit of it. “If you idiots would have just let me beam him up in the first place, we could have saved everyone a lot of trouble.” Without warning, the bright white light of an Asgard transporter took John and the others, depositing them back home in their hive.


	3. Todd's Hive versus the Universe

The ship drifted, her engines dead and a slow trail of atmosphere bleeding from one of her seals. There were seventy-two life signs on board, but there wouldn’t be for long. Todd was curious, but not overly interested, but John thought of the Travelers and their willingness to throw themselves into a fight or trust ships that were falling apart to keep flying. Clearly in this case, that trust had gone too far, but they were still admirable as a people.

John reached for the communications, and Todd only watched to see how this would play out.

“Bad idea,” Rodney observed.

“You think everything is a bad idea,” John countered.

Rodney didn’t answer with words, but he did send through a series of memories—a grand parade of John Sheppard’s bad ideas. And under all that was a fond exasperation and a confusion about why a man with so many bad ideas ended up always having his ideas work out.

“Luck,” John said. He opened communication. “This is…” Their ship didn’t have a name. Names that had existed during their human days were kept, but they felt no need to name new things. Todd was amused that they had just noticed this. “This is Rodney’s Twin calling the Traveler ship. Are you people doing repairs or are you as screwed as you look like?”

“Oh, we’re pretty much as screwed as we look, but we have some nice warheads onboard if you want to fly in real close and watch the show with us,” an overly cheerful voice answered. Yep, that was a Traveler—crazy as hell.

“Before you blow yourselves up, can we offer any help? We have an engineer on board.”

“Could you send him over?” The voice was hopeful now.

“That’s probably not going to happen,” John said. “Engineers are a little too valuable, and Travelers have a reputation for hanging onto anything of value. However, he could create any parts you need and send them over for your engineers.”

“We had a radiation seal fail. Most of our engineers are dead. The ones who aren’t are dying, and they’re not in any condition to carry out repairs. Unless you have facilities to offer an evacuation, you need to get clear before we blow her.”

John looked over. Clearly they didn’t have sensors and didn’t know they were talking to a hive. Todd immediately thought of seeding all of them. Rodney disagreed. They were reckless. They would push the hive mind too hard. John countered that if they evacuated them and delivered them, they would gain some good will among Travelers. 

Teyla moved in, sorting through their thoughts and pointing out where the two would benefit each other. Rodney could make ships. Grand ships. They could defend themselves against the Wraith or any other enemy with these ships, but they would have to take the seeding in order to have access to what they wanted. She sided with John, recommending that they show the Travelers what they could have and then send them on their way and allow envy to do its work a time. Then she withdrew from the hive mind, returning to her children. It sometimes bothered John how little time she spend with them, but Ronon gave him a solid push to get on with things. He would sit with Teyla.

The whole conversation had taken place in a few seconds, so John answered the Traveler’s unasked question. “We have space for you over here and we have transporters we might have borrowed off the Earthers on Atlantis.”

The Traveler laughed. “And you accuse us of hanging onto things of value?”

“Enough that I don’t trust you with my engineer,” John said. “Tell your people to gather up any supplies. We have water, and a reasonable store of food, but we have very little else, so if you want something, grab it.”

“Give us twenty minutes, and then transport everyone over. We have injured and children.”

“We don’t have much, but we’ll share what we do have,” John promised. 

 

 

 

“Okay, before anyone gets all twitchy with the guns, I want to give you two facts. One, this ship won’t respond to anyone who hasn’t been seeded, and two, we meant it when we said we can drop you off at any planet of your choice… within reason. I mean, we’re not going to fly to the other end of the galaxy, but if there’s a planet anywhere around here, we’ll drop you off.”

The woman standing at the front of the ragged and injured group of Traveler refugees spoke. “You’re Wraith,” she accused him.

Just as John had recently had a sudden epiphany that they hadn’t named anything, he had another one—humans named everything. If he allowed them to call him Wraith, the name would be a barrier to any trust. Rodney provided another word.

“We’re Chimera,” John corrected her. “We don’t hunt humans, and we have human food on board because that’s what we eat.”

She gestured toward the large hold where Rodney had deposited them. “The ship looks Wraith.”

“It’s Chimera, which means that it has both human technology and Wraith,” John explained.

Someone in the back spoke up. “Where’s the rest of the crew? Where are the critically injured?”

“Over on Rodney’s Twin with our doctor. This is… Rodney’s Other Twin.” John almost flinched at the blast of contempt Rodney shot his way. John was never again allowed to name anything. Ever. But in John’s defense, the human instinct to name things wasn’t in him anymore, and that’s how they always thought of the ships, as Rodney’s twins. 

“She’s slaved to the flight functions of our other ship, but we don’t have crew for her. Our transporters said that you all had healthy life signs, so it sent you here rather than overwhelm our sick bay. This way the doctor can get to the sick and injured more quickly.”

One of the children blurted out, “You let her sit empty?” There was childlike horror in her little voice.

“Ships are easy for Chimera to build, but we don’t reproduce like Wraith or humans, so we don’t build crews as quickly,” John tried to explain. “I’m John Sheppard.”

His name caused a ripple he hadn’t expected.

“And whatever thing you think I did I’m going to deny ever doing it,” John said while Rodney was mentally hovering over the transporter controls.

“You’re the Atlantean leader,” one of the men said.

“Oh, that. I was.” John shrugged. “They kinda kicked me out.”

The woman picked up the conversation now, and she had a wariness to her that reminded him of Larrin. “They said you were infected with a virus, that you were a Wraith worshipper now.”

“Oh no. No, I don’t worship them,” John said firmly. He would not let Earther prejudice define how the people of this galaxy saw the Chimera. “I think Wraith can be giant pains in the ass and most deserve to be shot on sight. I still do a lot of shooting of Wraith. I just also happen to think that the oldest of them are also smart enough to have a different relationship with humans.”

“They eat us,” an older man with contempt. “He’s a Wraith worshipper. We should kill him.”

John wasn’t in any real danger; there was too much caution in this group for a mob, so he focused on the captain. “Culling Wraith eat humans, and that’s pretty disgusting. If you point out where I can find a culling Wraith, I will be happy to destroy it. Chimera are different. We feed our Wraith members with our own life force and then grow more ourselves. We also have fully human members on Chimera ships, and they are never in danger. To eat a human is… Our brothers share our minds with us, so they would see eating a human as abhorrent as eating a Wraith.” Which was not as abhorrent as these people probably assumed. It was an act of desperation that would never be taken unless required for survival. 

“You have free run of the ship,” John continued. He knew they needed to talk amongst themselves, and they likely wouldn’t believe a word he said until they were safely delivered to some safe refuge. “The engine rooms and control deck are sealed off, but you may go anywhere else. The ship will tell us if you do any damage, and Rodney is very protective of his twins, so please don’t. Now, what planet would you like to be dropped off at?”

“Are you trying to tell us that you’re going to keep your word?” the woman asked.

“Why wouldn’t I?”

Someone from the back shouted, “Wraith see us as food.”

John gave them his best flyboy grin. “Then it’s good I’m Chimera and not Wraith. I don’t see you as food. Right now I see you as passengers who are being a little bit of a pain in the ass.”

 

 

 

 

 

John waited in the empty corridor and listened to the command staff talk. “If we could take this ship, it would carry hundreds.”

“And how do we control it?” a woman’s voice asked. John was almost certain that was the captain, although sometimes siblings sounded enough alike that it might be a sister.

“We could take one of the freaks,” someone else offered. John was just offended by that. A small group of humans could not take his hive. Todd’s and Rodney’s contempt echoed through his mind. “We could grab Sheppard when he comes over,” the idiot suggested.

“So we grab him, then what do we do? Do we order him to open fire on the other ship and run?”

“Yes.” Oh yeah, that one was a real idiot.

“That is why I’m the captain and you’re not. Your plans are horrible.”

“We can’t just walk away from a ship. They’re going to ground us. With the Starjumper gone, they’re going to drop us on some planet at the mercy of the Wraith.” The desperation in his voice made things a little clearer. If there was one thing Travelers feared more than radiation, it was being grounded.

“They might,” the captain admitted.

“Then we have to find a way to take this ship.”

“How? How do we take a ship that’s half hive? It doesn’t respond to us, and we don’t even know how it works. Yes, we need a ship, but Rodney’s Other Twin is not an option.”

“Damn it.”

“Linnier…” the captain said sympathetically. Her voice trailed off to nothing because she didn’t have any options.

“No, you don’t get it,” he said, his voice hard. “I have a kid. You’re asking me to accept that I’m going to be dropped on the ground to be cattle for the Wraith, to watch my kid grow up in the dirt knowing that his destiny is to get eaten. I won’t do it. We have to find a ship.”

“Where Linnier? The universe has been picked clean. There are no other ships to be had.”

“Which is why we have to take this one.”

“If either of us had any idea how to run this ship, I would listen to your ideas, but we don’t. It’s not our ship.”

John stepped into the room. “But she could be,” he said. Both Travelers were on their feet, hands on weapons. John held his own hands up in surrender. “You aren’t doing anything that I wouldn’t do in your same situation,” John assured them. “You’d be idiots to ignore the potential in the ship.”

“It’s empty. You don’t even need it,” Linnier said.

“No, we don’t need it, but it’s a living ship. Wraith burn out the intelligence that is part of a hive, but for Chimera, life is more valuable,” John said, which was almost true. Todd hadn’t seen any reason to leave the hive personality, but the humans liked the friendly feel of the big mind against theirs. She wasn’t smart, but she had a presence like your family dog. She understood many things and she loved them. It was a calming influence for a hive full of human thoughts and emotions. “She is alive, and as much as she likes having you in her, as much as she likes feeling life, she can’t understand you, so you can’t fly her.”

“It’s sentient?” The captain looked more than a little concerned.

John nodded. “To some extent. She has feelings. She can talk to you. Don’t ask her complicated questions because you’ll just upset her because she wants to make you happy and doesn’t know how.”

“And you leave her floating alone?” The captain gave John a look that challenged him to explain that.

John smiled. “She is the twin of our ship. The two ships sing together, so they aren’t alone. If you tried to take this ship, you’d find that she wouldn’t fire on her sister and she wouldn’t leave her, not when the rest of the space is empty of any song she likes.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning she can hear the minds of culling Wraith—all of us who had been seeded can—but it’s a horrible screeching noise.” John didn’t add that desperation and hunger were the main reasons for that. “It’s like hearing someone with a very high voice scream and scream. No Chimera would stay near that. However, without some minds to listen to, Rodney’s Other Twin would be alone—isolated.”

The captain wasn’t an idiot. “So, if you change us, we can have the ship?”

Linnier stood fast, his hand tightening around his gun. “You touch my daughter and I’ll kill you.”

John leaned back against the wall and studied the man’s emotions. He wasn’t joking in the least. “I would never change a child. Children have to grow up and make their own choices. They are hive kin by definition.”

“Hive kin?”

John nodded. This was the delicate point where he had to create the future he wanted for his people. Todd was amused given that John wanted to give others choices he had not been given, choices that Rodney called ridiculous given human illogic. However, they could both keep their noses out of this. “Our ships have Chimera, hive-kin Humans, and Wraith. The hive kin have not been chosen for the seeding, but they are the spouses or children of those who have been. If a woman proves herself brave enough to have earned the seeding, that does not mean we want her children or her spouses in the hive mind with us. Every person is chosen because we want them. We trust them.”

The captain laughed. “And you want us to believe that you trust us enough to invite us into this mind?”

“No,” John said firmly. “I don’t know you well enough to know what you would bring to our hive. I am saying you could be your own hive if you chose.”

The captain’s emotions shifted sharply. She was even more suspicious now.

“You would have Rodney’s Other Twin, so you would not be able to attack us any more than you could get two dogs who were raised together to turn on each other. You would provide the Chimera and hive-kin Humans. We would provide the ship.”

“And the Wraith,” the captain added as she saw the trap. “You would expect us to take in Wraith, feed them.”

John could see her suspicious wane as she spotted the danger in the plan, but her disgust rose exponentially. 

“We have no Wraith kin to share right now,” John said. “Our Wraith kin, Todd, would have to perform the seeding. However, we have two Wraith children. It would mean that for a decade or so, our two ships would have to stay close, each tethered to Todd until one of the children was old enough to become the center of your hive mind.”

“You send a Wraith over here, and we’ll kill it,” Linnier threatened.

John nodded. “Okay. It was just an offer. I wanted to find a way to offer you the ship.”

“And how insistent are you that we take you up on your offer?” the captain asked. She expected John to force them into the seeding. Teyla stirred long enough to protest that such an action would be no better than the culling Wraith feeding. Of all of them, she was the one most likely to present a dissenting voice, and John counted on that to help him keep the others from pushing forward when patience would gain them more results. Ironically, Todd was the other who would encourage the hive to wait and watch.

“Not insistent at all,” John said. “A hive needs Wraith members to hold the hive mind together—to act as the center. Our battles against the culling Wraith have left us with only one grown Wraith member. The two children are so young they have not even chosen names,” John said, neatly avoiding any need to provide names. “We would rather wait twenty or thirty years before adding more Chimera and hive-kin to our numbers. But since you wanted the ship and since Travelers have strong ties to each other already, I made the offer. Nothing more. We’ll drop you on the nearest planet and go back to our business.”

“How many full Wraith members do you normally have?” the captain asked. She wanted intelligence on someone she considered a potential enemy, but John was fine with that. It allowed him to plant a seed, although in this case it was metaphorical.

“A full hive would never have more than three to five full Wraith warriors. It takes between ten and twenty Chimera to provide for a single Wraith warrior, so a hive with five Wraith adults will stop having any full Wraith children.” He didn’t discuss drones. Besides, they were emergency shock troops, grown and kept in pods until needed, and if there were no humans to feed them, the Wraith warriors would take their life force.

“And human children?”

“We can’t have human children. We reproduce by inviting others to join us. Hive kin are still fully human and have the potential to produce children, but we could never rely on such a small population for new members.”

The captain narrowed her eyes. 

“Yes,” John answered her unspoken question, “That means that we rely on having a large pool of untouched humans so that we can find those we admire enough to invite into the hive. Each hive needs thousands of untouched humans on free worlds so that we can trade, recruit, and get fresh food. Our survival depends on having large populations, not on harvesting planets. We are not culling Wraith.”

“I appreciate the offer…” the captain started.

“But you would rather not commit yourself and your crew to the mercy of a Chimera,” John said. 

“Something like that.”

John shrugged. “Okay. We’ll be at the planet you picked in two days, and we’ll be landing so you can evacuate your crew.” It would also give the small population of ground-bound Travelers a chance to see the two huge ships. A person couldn’t want what they didn’t know about. Considering the twins still had the long lines of the Ancient warships they had been grown around, every Traveler would soon be feeling serious envy.

 

 

 

 

John sat on the lowered entry ramp and soaked up the sun that streamed down from the oversized sun. He liked this planet. 

“Well, look who it is.”

John opened his eyes to see Larrin standing some distance away. She leaked a sort of weary grief. John was so tired of people mourning his loss when he was still sitting here. However he pasted on a cocky grin. “Larrin!”

“John Sheppard. I can see the rumors of your death were wrong.”

He knew she was looking at his Wraith coloring. “Slightly,” he agreed. He sat up and rested his arms against his knees. “So, what brings you to this part of the universe?”

“I heard that these new Wraith ships we’ve been hearing about brought home one of my crews. I found that interesting.”

John shrugged. “It seemed the neighborly thing to do.”

“Yeah. I find it interesting that the planets you choose to trade with are so close to the planet we’ve chosen.” She had always possessed such a suspicious mind. Todd admired that.

“Our protected planets are near an asteroid field that Rodney likes to mine for raw materials.”

“Right,” Larrin said without pretending she believed it.

“I suspect you chose this planet because of that same mineral rich asteroid belt. This is the nearest uninhabited planet with a Stargate.”

Larrin gave him a little smile and a twitch of her head that meant she wouldn’t deny it. “That doesn’t explain why you landed your big ass ships on my planet.”

“Oh, you know why I did that.”

“So, you’re not going to deny it?”

“What? That I’d like to poach your crews? Nope. Can’t deny what’s obviously true.”

“My people aren’t Wraith worshippers.”

“Good. Mine aren’t either.”

“Really? I hear you have a Wraith in there right now.”

“Todd? Yeah, he’s in there. We don’t worship him, though.” John grimaced. “That would be creepy.”

Larrin looked at him like he’d lost his mind. “Creepy?” she demanded.

“Yeah. I mean, I see inside his head, so I know way too much about him to worship him. I know how long he can hold a grudge—which is a hell of a long time—and I know how he gets all stupidly mushy around children. Even human children give him a little tingle of ‘awww cute.’” John shrugged like it didn’t matter to him. Todd protested how John characterized him, but the entire hive chimed in on that one. 

Todd felt incredible pride when looking at the two Wraith children, and even the sight of Teyla’s human children gave him a warm rush of pride that he had found a new hive that was strong enough to reproduce. Strong hives raised children; weak ones grew only drones in pods. Todd’s hive had Wraith drones. Mostly they rested in hibernation chambers until such time as the hive might need their mindless devotion. However, they could invest the resources to raise children who would develop their own minds and opinions.

Larrin snorted. “Well that’s disturbing considering that he then eats them.”

“He always avoided eating children,” John said. And that was even true of the last two or three thousand years. Before that, Todd hadn’t really thought about the age of his victims. “However, until he came up with a solution to his dietary problems, he had to eat people or die. He’s not interested in dying.”

“So he ate people,” Larrin said with disgust.

“Until he could figure out another solution, yep.”

Larrin sat down next to him. “Sheppard, you are one crazy bastard.”

He grinned t her. “Oh, I am not touching that. You’re the one with all the crazy plans, including exposing me to radiation to get me to surrender.”

“And you put out the signal that attracted the Wraith.”

“And you had that crazy plan to get rid of them.”

“And you forgot to lock down the controls before leaving the control room, so I was forced to come up with that crazy plan.”

John flinched. That had been stupid. “I was trying to get to you fast enough to save your life.”

She rolled her eyes and some of the tension eased, so clearly she realized that he was still really John Sheppard. “One extra second—that’s how long it would have taken you to think ‘off.’”

Maybe,” John admitted with a shrug, “but I still saved you from getting eaten.”

She sighed and for a time they sat next to each other, two old warriors remembering past battles. “What the hell are you doing, Sheppard. You have to know my people are never going to agree to crew your ships.”

“Maybe. However, Rodney needed to do an external inspection of the twins, and this was as good of a place to land as any.”

“And it just happened to be where my shipless people could see your big empty ships. You’re a manipulative bastard, but it’s still not going to work.”

“Okay.”

She narrowed her eyes. “You’re still just as annoying.”

“I’ve actually had a few people tell me that,” John admitted with a laugh. Some of them were even in his head.

“Are you going to get off my planet?”

“Well, yeah. It seems pretty stupid to have big space ships and leave them on the ground all the time.” John continued to look up into the sky. It was a brilliant blue with just a hint of purple around the edges of the clouds. Every once in a while, John would slip, and the Wraith disgust at any space devoid of life would make him see a huge wasteland, an empty void that felt more threatening than welcoming. However, as long as John concentrated, he could see the world as his human self once would have. 

The silence continued for a long time before Larrin sighed and asked, “Are you getting off soon?”

“A week or so, unless culling Wraith come sniffing around our protected planets. Then we’ll be taking off sooner.”

Larrin sat up and studied him. “That implies you would know if ships came near those planets.”

“We have Rodney. He gets bored and comes up with really cool new toys,” John admitted.

“So, you do have the other Lanteans,” Larrin said smugly, clearly pleased at getting intelligence out of him. Of course, that wasn’t exactly a secret, but John let her enjoy her victory.

“We have the ones who vanished before Caldwell took over. We also have those that couldn’t get through the Gate to the Genii homeworld before the city started shaking herself to death,” John said.

“And are they all these new Chimera that my people are talking about?”

“Nope,” John said. “Some didn’t want the change. They’re in there, riding around and really hoping we run across an Earther ship sometime soon. Others are Chimera.

“Did they volunteer?” Larrin asked, a challenge in her voice.

John smiled and thought about how he’d given up, giving his body to Todd out of a desire to die. “I did. I never asked the others.” Of course he didn’t need to ask. He knew exactly who had agreed, who had given up in despair, and who had fought every step of the way.

“I thought you shared a mind.”

“We share thoughts about what’s going on now. We don’t have one big memory,” John corrected her. He sat up. “So, do you want the grand tour?”

“I don’t know. Am I going to come out human?”

John grinned. “I’m guessing you have all sorts of weapons aimed at us, so we wouldn’t seed you even if you asked really nicely.”

She gave him a wide smile. “That might be true.”

“You haven’t changed either,” John said as he pushed himself to his feet and gestured for her to come up the ramp. 

“I’ll do whatever it takes to protect my people.”

“And Chimera aren’t a threat to you. Well, not really. We’d love to invite some of your crews onto our ships, but that’s not a threat as much as a competing offer that we plan to leave on the table.”

Larrin started up the ramp. “My people won’t take it.”

“Really? Are you sure they’d choose to get abandoned on the ground rather than take passage on one of our ships?

“I’m sure they’d die before becoming Wraith worshippers.”

“Okay, why does everyone assume I worship the Wraith? I’m not really much into organized religion at all, but if I was going to worship something, I’d make a god of rollercoasters and ferris wheels. That would be a church I could get behind.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Larrin pointed out as they walked into the interior of the ship. Rodney’s twin liked Larrin. She was direct, and John liked that, so Rodney’s Twin liked it. Rodney sent through a few choice thoughts of his own about how he felt about the woman, and then Rodney’s Twin was just confused. John sent out a soothing thought. The Twin didn’t need an opinion. She was only visiting.

“Worshipping ferris wheels would make perfect sense if you’d ever ridden one. I should get Rodney to install an amusement park on one of our planets.”

“An amusement park?” Larrin sounded it out, clearly trying to figure out how those words fit together. Most people in the Pegasus galaxy didn’t have time for parks at all, much less parks designed to give them thrills. Just surviving was enough of a thrill for most people, but the protected planets didn’t have to worry about Wraith, so maybe they’d enjoy a few safe thrills. John really was going to ask Rodney to make one.

Immediately he felt the distant sort of scorn and derision that meant that Rodney thought he was an idiot, but he was probably going to indulge John anyway. When John first picked Rodney for his team, that attitude had bothered him. Sometimes he wondered if Rodney thought he was a poor choice as military leader of Atlantis. He’d been just insecure enough that every once in a while Rodney’s barbs found home. Now he could feel the love there, even while Rodney was being Rodney.

“Maybe it’s time for the people of this galaxy to start having lives that don’t center around trying to survive the Wraith,” John said. “So, you can see that you have an ancient warship under the hive skin, but you’re going to love this display,” John said as he headed over to a computer interface. Rodney wanted to be the one to show off his baby, but he had to admit that Larrin trusted John more. So Rodney sent dozens of spiders into John’s head, each prompting John to show off a different feature. But other than that, the rest of the hive made themselves scarce as John showed off Rodney’s Twin to a woman who was clearly salivating at the thought of having that much technology at her fingertips. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

John leaned against the console and considered his old commanding officer. “General O’Neill, how nice of you to not shoot at us.”

“Oh, I considered. Believe me, I considered.” From his tone, he was considering shooting at them right now. “Colonel Lorne, are you okay?” he asked without taking his eyes off John.

“Yes, sir. Tired of being locked up in the same rooms, but fine.”

“And as much as we love having to feed people who sit on their asses all day, we got tired of waiting to see your ships and decided to come to the source and give your people back,” John said. 

“You’re just giving them back?”

“Well I thought about keeping them, but they don’t match the décor, and I’m too lazy to repaint.”

“And what do you plan to do after that?”

“Oh, we thought we’d wander over to Disneyland, land a puddle jumper, take Todd on a few rides.” John rolled his eyes and the stupidity of the question. “General, we don’t want Earth. We also don’t want other Wraith to get Earth. I know it’s been a few years, but would you consider having that talk about a truce now?”

“You brought two massive hive ships in-system to discuss a truce?”

“Considering how you keep shooting at me, it seemed wise to have a little backup. Look, I’m not suggesting we be friends—”

“That’s good because we won’t be. I tend to not like people who take good young officers and skin them alive before turning them into half-alien hybrids. It’s just a policy I have.”

“Well good for you. It’s nice to know that humanity is still keeping up that egocentric world view.”

“Sheppard,” Lorne said wearily, “it’s done. Do you really have to keep being an ass?”

“No, but I enjoy it.

Lorne rolled his eyes. “Sir, about two hundred or so evacuated to the Genii homeworld before the Gate failed. Do you have any word on them? Did the Daedalus go back for them?”

John knew from the shifting emotions in O’Neill that the news wasn’t good, but Lorne still projected hope. Part of John wanted to stun them all before the general had a chance to crush Lorne. Losing the city was bad; losing his people would hit him so much harder.

O’Neill looked at Lorne with sympathy, and the emotions in the room started to shift. “There was a Genii civil war not long after. Forty-three of our people died, including almost all of the military personnel. They protected the scientists at great loss of life. We recovered as many of the scientists as we could, and that’s when the Genii suffered great loss of life.” 

The weight of Lorne’s pain almost unbearable for John, so he couldn’t imagine how Lorne felt. From the sounds of it, human scientists had been enslaved. Lorne’s people had needed him, and he hadn’t been there. John knew that pain so intimately that he couldn’t escape feeling it with Lorne. His hive mates pushed in, offering comfort, but John pushed back. He had created this, and the least he could do was feel the pain with Lorne. The man had earned that much. Rodney was not happy.

“How many did you rescue?” Lorne asked, his voice flat even though his emotions were chaotic.

“One hundred and seventeen. Forty-three died, twenty-four are unaccounted for, and fifteen refused to leave. We were in Pegasus several times, trying to find the rest of you.”

A curl of suspicion appeared in Lorne’s emotions. He could suspect what he wanted—he had no proof.

“Lorne, we can put out word,” John said softly. “I don’t know if anyone will trust us, but I’ll put out word that we will offer passage to anyone who is trying to get home to Earth.” John didn’t feel guilty for those who had suffered because of their plan, but he felt like he should be guilty. That was enough for him to offer his help. He tried very hard to ignore the realization that he also wanted a reason to come back here, to begin establishing his hive’s right to be in this galaxy. John really disliked the mercenary turn of his own thoughts.

O’Neill was watching him with that same wariness John had seen in him in the Gate room all those years ago. “Playing altruist, are you?”

John shook his head. “You never did understand Todd’s position. He will do anything to protect his hive, but he does not care about the other Wraith. In fact, the more Wraith there are, the more pressure that puts on the human populations he depends on.

“You mean, he eats.”

“No, he depends on humans to grow food to feed the hybrids so we can feed him. More Wraith puts that system in danger. So here’s your free tip for the day. A Wraith queen only needs two things to reproduce, power and pods for the drones to grow in. The Ancients screwed the pooch because they let Wraith get ahold of ZPMs. With a ZPM, one queen can create an almost infinite number of full grown drones in under two months. So, if Wraith show up, do not let them get ahold of a ZPM, a naqueda generator, a nuclear generator, a goa’uld mother ship or any other source of significant power.”

“I think we can figure that one out on our own, Sheppard.”

“Yeah, and you’d think that would have been common sense for the Ancients, but clearly not so much. They left ZPMs lying around like candy. They abandoned ships and left them on self-destruct clocks with hours on them. They did all sorts of truly stupid things. The Wraith will take every mistake and turn it into a million new Wraith drones knocking on your door.”

“We’ll keep that in mind. Colonel Lorne, how many of our people have you brought home?”

Lorne looked over at John, clearly uncomfortable with the answer, but John wasn’t going to save him. As an officially disgraced member of the Air Force, he didn’t have to put up with pissy generals anymore.

“We evacuated ninety-seven, but only sixty-four will be transferring over to your ship.

O’Neill gave John a nasty glare. “Did someone get peckish on the trip here?” he asked in a truly annoying tone of voice.

Lorne saved John from having to do something drastic like punch O’Neill in the neck. “Sir, the hybrids have made their case for our people to join them. Several did, either because of relationships they had with those who are already hive or because they liked the sales pitch.”

O’Neill’s eyebrows went up. “They liked the sales pitch? Hey, come join us and we’ll skin you alive and take over your minds. Yeah, that sounds like a great plan. Did any of your people happen to suffer brain damage during the evacuation?”

“They wanted to fight the culling Wraith, and they trusted Sheppard when he said that they would be more…” Lorne clearly struggled. John sighed. He really should let Lorne sort this out, but he couldn’t leave the man hanging.

“Most of them chose to join because they were lost and alone and tired of being afraid and annoyed and helpless to do anything to change any of the above. They saw their city destroyed. Some of them wanted the comfort of home, of family.”

O’Neill gave him a truly viscous glare. “And you offered that,” he said, his tone flat. If O’Neill had his finger on the button for a nuke, he would have pressed it.

“They offered a chance to be part of a different sort of organization,” Teldy said as she walked in the room. She gave John a smile and sent across the thought that perhaps he didn’t have the patience to work with O’Neill.”

“Teldy. I guess the Genii didn’t get you after all,” O’Neill said with a sigh.

“Mehra wanted me. Being hive is a lot like being team mates. There’s a loyalty and a love there, but there’s more because of the telepathy. The ones who joined wanted that security of being inside a powerful team. They were tired of losing. Every time they turned around, they seemed to be going to another funeral. They were fatigued and far from home.”

“And now they’re home and we have a pretty good mental health system if you’d let them out of your big hive mind.”

“None of them want to leave,” Teldy said. 

“Branton?” Lorne asked. 

Teldy smiled at him. “He loves these computer systems. We’ve talked, and I understand why he doesn’t choose the seeding, but this is his home, and he won’t leave it.”

John felt disappointed that Branton didn’t want them; however, he respected that the man didn’t want to share his pain. He had come to Atlantis after his SG team had been tortured and then turned into hosts by a goa’uld, and to give himself to the Wraith felt like betrayal of that team and their sacrifice. John would honor his choice, and so would Todd, even if he wasn’t happy about it. Some people would choose being hive kin over being hive mates. John could betray Atlantis and give her and her people over to Todd, so Todd could respect a few human quirks.

“Colonel Lorne, I would just as soon start transferring people quickly.”

“Yes sir. Sir,” Lorne called before O’Neill could call for his own ship to transport him back. “Sir, I won’t be coming.”

John looked at Lorne in shock. In fact, he could feel that shock reverberate through the whole hive.

“Lorne?” O’Neill’s tone carried a world of warning.

“I’m needed out here to fight the Wraith that are still culling. At least, I think I am.” Lorne looked at John, and his whole emotional landscape was a miasma of pain and loss and certainty of rejection. He was waiting to be told he wasn’t good enough for hive, yet he had asked in front of O’Neill, which meant that he would be in big shit if he went with the humans. The psychiatrists were going to lock him in a little room.

And John got it.

Lorne had found his breaking point just as John had found his when he’d been forced to watch Rodney hanging from the rack. There was a point at which pain was preferable. You wanted it because it was the only pure thing in your life. Loss and guilt stained every other corner of the world. If John were a true friend, he would send Lorne back to Earth for lots of therapy and some good drugs.

“Two to beam out now!” O’Neill called into his radio. He reached out to grab Lorne’s arm, but it was the mere flicker of a thought that brought up the shield on the twin.

“Sir, we can’t get a lock, the shields are up.”

“Great,” O’Neill muttered. “Colonel Lorne, I am ordering you back to the Hammond.”

John moved to Lorne’s side and rested a hand on his shoulder. “And I’m offering you that invitation you turned down before. You were the best second I ever had and I would be proud to have you in the hive.”

“Sheppard, this is an act of war,” O’Neill warned.

“This is one friend offering another a place to stay,” John disagreed. “Being in Atlantis, we were far enough away from the generals that we had some protection, but face it, your military chews people up and spits them back out. There’s never enough support or time to heal before you’re sending us out again.”

“Then we get the colonel some help,” O’Neill said slowly. “If you take him prisoner, all hope of a truce is off.”

John could feel Lorne’s horror. The idiot was probably blaming himself for ruining any chance of a peace. It was the sort of stupidity John would have believed at one point in his life. He laughed. “We will never have a truce, General. You have every intention of trying to blow us up the second you get back to your ship, don’t you?” John could see the truth of it in O’Neill’s emotions. “All those people—your people— that we saved and fed and protected—you would kill them. You would force the unchanged humans to watch their old team mates die. You are a piece of work.”

“I’m responsible for protecting this planet.”

“And I’m taking responsibility for protecting Lorne. We’ll transport the others over to your ship using a shuttle, but Lorne is staying here.”

“Sheppard,” Lorne said quietly. John turned to watch the doorway as Todd came through it. He radiated approval. He had disliked letting Lorne leave, but now he would have Lorne and he would have him willingly. The smugness was almost rolling through the hive. Todd had chosen his hive well, chosen them so well that they did what even Todd believed impossible. They were strong hive mates.

The whole hive shivered under the pleasure of the compliment.

“Lorne, we want you. We have always wanted you, and given a choice between a truce with xenophobic asses on a little backwater planet or you, we will choose you.” John rested his palm on Lorne’s cheek, and he could feel the shiver go through Lorne. How long had it been since he had a simple touch? John remembered the quiet XO who had used his days off to paint, and the tired man in front of him had very little of that Evan Lorne left. 

“Come,” Todd said. He held out his hand, and Lorne looked at it.

“Colonel, you need to tell them that you changed your mind,” O’Neill said in the sort of calm and quiet voice a person might use with a child or victim. Lorne was hurt, but he was no victim. O’Neill’s words seemed to push him over that moment of indecision because he took Todd’s hand and let Todd lead him away.

“Sheppard, you’ll pay for that,” O’Neill warned.

“No, no I won’t,” John answered. “We will love him and take care of him. He’s worth more to us that a planet that none of us have any interest in seeing again.”

“McKay’s sister has been asking about him,” O’Neill said.

John pulled a cube out of his pocket. “Rodney made this. It will use the Gate system to essentially leave a callback number on every memory buffer as the pattern travels like a virus from one Gate to another. If we see this, it means you desperately need us back here. But I’m going to warn you right now, unless the problem is culling Wraith, we probably aren’t going to care.” He threw it, and O’Neill caught it instinctively.

“So, you’ll come running home to save us from the Wraith?”

John shrugged. “The one future Todd wants to avoid is the one where the Wraith find their way here and breed up until there are millions upon millions of Wraith feeding across this galaxy. Wraith were genetically created from humans, and they carry the same self-destructive greed in them. So yes, Todd would rush here to save you from Wraith because he will not have young and desperate Wraith destroy the species he relies on. This has always been about Todd protecting his position.”

“At least you’re honest about it.”

“I’ve never lied,” John said with a grin. Depending on the definition of lie, that was even true.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Hey,” John said softly.

Lorne was sitting on the edge of the bed radiating a bone-deep exhaustion. “Hey,” he answered.

“You’ve made your choice, and it doesn’t matter, but tell me. Do you believe things will get better or do you believe you’re about to die and leave Todd your body?”

Lorne took a deep breath. “I believe it doesn’t matter anymore. I can’t go back to being Colonel Lorne, the bright, shiny officer who carries out his duties.”

John sat down on the edge of the bed. “You could choose to be hive-kin. Rodney and I would take you in. You don’t have to go through the seeding.”

“Yeah, I do. I can’t stay here and stay me. I hate myself for agreeing to this, and the seeding is the only way to get out from under all that pain. God, O’Neill must think I’m pathetic.”

“I think he assumes you’re suffering a raging case of PTSD with a bit of identity crisis brought on my long-term captivity.”

Lorne gave a mirthless laugh. “He’s right.”

“You just reached a point where you couldn’t carry any more, Evan. I reached that point, and I just want to point out that even if you’re stupid enough to ask for the sort of seeding I asked for, I’m not going to let Todd hurt you like that.”

“I’m not the masochist you are. I never even dreamed of asking.”

“Oh.”

Lorne looked at him. “You thought I would?”

“Well, yeah.”

“No. No, I want to be unconscious for as much of this as I can be. So how do we do this?”

“Take your shirt off and lie back. Todd will use the enzyme to get into your head, and then he can put you to sleep while the seeding takes place.”

“I won’t remember any of it?”

“No. Todd has gotten pretty good at this part,” John said. Maybe he was a masochist because part of him liked having that sharp line, that memory of pain that delineated the then-him and the now-him. Rodney stirred in the back of his mind, but John shushed him. He didn’t want pain now, but he was glad there had been pain. It was like the explosion that Atlantis had set off. It had battered her shields and damaged several towers, but those were birth pains. 

Rodney sent out a thought that Atlantis and John had been isolated together too long because they were both insane. John smiled.

“Rodney’s talking to you, isn’t he?” Lorne asked.

John nodded. “Yeah. I just had the thought that the pain was good, it was right to have a sort of rebirth complete with the labor pains. He called me… I suppose insane is the closest word I can find.”

“You might be,” Lorne said.

John shrugged. “Probably. But at least now I have hive to pull me back in when I get too self-destructive. Trust me, I was way worse before Rodney.” John thought about that for a second. “Even before hive, Rodney had a way of reeling me back in.” 

“Yeah, he always did,” Lorne agreed. Todd walked into the room, and Lorne’s fear spiked.

John put a hand on his shoulder and urged him to lie back on the bed. “You’re safe, Evan.”

“This is going to hurt.”

“There’s physical pain when he takes the energy, yes. It’s bearable. When it puts the energy back in, it will feel really good. Eventually when he takes the energy out, you’ll realize that your pain doesn’t matter, and you’ll turn yourself over to his care.”

Lorne looked up at him. “You know, we’re probably all damned to hell for this.”

“Then we’ll have to make sure we don’t die,” John answered. He squeezed Lorne’s shoulder as Wraith vines grew up and around the bed, tangling around Lorne’s limbs to hold him in place. Todd moved closer to the bed, and John yielded his spot. Lorne needed to belong to Todd first. That was the way of things for them. John would simply wait until Lorne was ready to open himself to the whole hive. They had time now.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Colonel Jennifer Haley looked over the energy readings again. She was brilliant, but even the late, great General Samantha Carter wouldn’t have been able to make the planetary shields hold and run the Stargate and keep the lights on in New York and Moscow. People were unreasonable asses. She thought that back when she was in the Academy and Major Samantha Carter had come to visit her, and she thought it now.

“Colonel, not good enough,” General Romensky said.

“Sir, I do not have the ability to do better. The Wraith bombardment is taking too heavy of a toll. If this keeps up, I’m not sure our ZPM network will hold.”

“Colonel, this is the survival of the human race we’re talking about.”

Haley thought that was a little far-fetched. In the twenty five years since the Lucian Alliance had shown up and essentially outed the Stargate program to the public, humans had moved into every corner of the universe. Earth was the most densely populated planet and one of the most technologically advanced thanks to the Goa’uld repression of human and jaffa technology, but it was hardly the survival of the entire race. It was, however, her personal survival and the survival of her people. Over two hundred Air Force techs looked to her for leadership. 

She stared the general right in the eye. “There is no more power. I recommend that if you want the shield to hold, that you cut all countries off from the ZPM grid.”

“That is unacceptable.”

“Sir, if we don’t, the shield will fall.”

He brought his hand down on the table. “Find another solution!” he bellowed. Haley desperately missed the leadership of General Carter or even General O’Neill. He’d been a sarcastic ass, but under all the attitude, he listened to his people. Haley had been a lieutenant back when he’d finally retired for good, but she still had some fond memories of him. She hadn’t been at his funeral, but it had been televised and half the world’s diplomats showed up. General Romensky would sacrifice his first born son to get that kind of attention, but the irony was that General O’Neill never cared about being a hero. If he could have, he would have skipped his own funeral.

Haley shot to her feet when the general stood and then stormed out of her office.

“Ma’am?” Captain Selah looked concerned. Haley was too, but she was the sort of person who found solutions. She was also the sort of person who knew what they had in the back of the closet at Area 51.

“Get me a transport to New Mexico. The general ordered us to find another solution, and we’re going to do exactly that.”

 

 

 

 

John focused on his wing of drones, guiding them through the hive ship’s defenses. Rodney’s Twin was taking heaving damage and John’s Dream had already been forced to retreat. The ship would pick off those that fled after Rodney’s Twin and Rodney’s Other Twin broke the hive formation.

Todd nudged him, and John shifted to cover Teldy’s flight of darts. The drones focused on their tasks, determined to protect their hive, but John could also feel the hive minds from the enemy ships. Rodney’s Other Twin never felt like home, but there was a familiarity in the hive mind, a song that he could fall into if he didn’t have his own hive. These enemies were rogue hives, cullers. Their song was sour and made John want to rip them all out of the word. 

John’s hatred drove his drones on, and only John’s own skill with flying allowed him to avoid having his whole wing destroyed on the rolling edge of one of the broken hives as it drifted through space. John could feel Rodney cautioning him, but now was the time for aggression. John reached out and pushed.

His wing of drones went in under Teldy’s and opened fire on the docking bays. Their missiles died on the hive’s shields, but then Rodney’s Twin started firing her heavy forward guns again. The enemy hive shivered, and then the fire from John’s wing penetrated the shield and the inside of the rogue hive began to explode.

John sent a query, one drone to fly his ship into the middle of the enemy and self-destruct. All John’s drones sent back an earnest desire to serve in such a role. John chose one based on the ship’s location and sent it at the rogue. He called his others back.

“A whole flight of suicidal, adrenaline junky pilots. We never should have let you train the unit on your own,” Rodney complained. He didn’t put too much heat behind it. He was busy overseeing the repairs to his ship. John could also feel his worry for Rodney’s Other Twin. The ship wasn’t theirs anymore, but they were allies, and she was still the child of Rodney’s flesh and blood. 

John checked with the other queen and warrior class hive members. Teyla and Bihot were with the hive children. Ronon had his own flight engaging another hive, the last one standing. Rodney’s Other Twin was hitting it with heavy firepower, so it wouldn’t survive much longer, but John knew better than to ask Ronon to call back his drones before every culling Wraith was dead. The hive had not changed his hatred for anyone who would feed on children or even civilians. His feelings were so strong that John doubted Todd even could feed on anyone except a warrior who had been given a fair chance to fight back, not without feeling Ronon’s disgust like an illness. 

Mehra, Teldy, Banks and Stackhouse were bringing the John’s Dream around, using the smaller more maneuverable ship to pick off the darts now that the hives were gone. Crown, Edison, Elliott, Dorsey, Rutherford, and Lorne were all leading their own flights. Cadman, Hansen, Bester, Durfee, Anton, and Heath were all running the heavy guns. Radek and Miko were running repairs beside Rodney. Carson, Kiang, McBride, and Nieves were all monitoring the hive members and tending the injured while Ramirez and Robbins were specifically tasked to internal security of the hive. Todd watched with the cool pleasure he got from a well-organized hive. 

Cade stood with him. He was full Wraith, the warrior son of Teldy. Mehra’s son Dean was the core of their allied hive over on Rodney’s Other Twin. Cade still tended to remain in the back of the hive mind, learning how to be Wraith without letting his instinct for feeding rule him. Teyla had four more immature full Wraith in the nursery along with a half dozen human children, hive-kin. Her own sons had grown and left—one to the protected colonies and the other to explore the universe. She still missed them, and that filled the hive with a longing for more children. The one thing the Chimera did give up was the ability to have children like themselves. 

John felt like he had too much energy crawling under his skin. The fight had geared him up for more, and now there were no enemies left to engage. John sent an image of Todd feeding on him and Rodney tonight, and Todd quickly agreed. He would share in the excitement of his hive mates as they saved homeworld.

Homeworld. 

Earth.

John wasn’t sure it was their home anymore. It had been a few decades since he’d seen it. In Chimera reckoning of time, that was nothing. But on the other hand, it felt like a lifetime ago. The last time he’d even seen it from space, he was bringing Lorne and his crew back. The fact that he was born here wouldn’t prevent him for looking for some advantage for his hive. He owed these people nothing. But after he’d saved them, and not for the first time, they owed him. Colonel John Sheppard may not have asked for payment, but John part of the hive of Todd sure would.

“This is Earth ship Yue Fei, please identify yourselves or we will open fire.”

John felt the amusement ripple through his hive, and Ronon’s fight of darts was close enough to Rodney’s Other Twin that he could feel the answering echo from them. A ship hiding under a shield was threatening them after they had just dispatched three hive ships. John remembered when they could have ripped through three hive ships by themselves, but the culling Wraith were growing stronger, driven by necessity to adapt or die. And now these Wraith had found Earth. Yes, there was advantage to be had for a clever hive.

John opened a radio frequency.


End file.
